


The end of something

by nishiki



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: 1960s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Mental Institution, Anger Management, Big Sibling Luther Hargreeves, Childhood Trauma, Delusions, Diego Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Diego Hargreeves is Bad at Feelings, Dysfunctional Family, Family Feels, Family Issues, Family Reunions, Gen, Good Sibling Allison Hargreeves, Good Sibling Diego Hargreeves, Good Sibling Luther Hargreeves, Hallucinations, Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Klaus Hargreeves Needs Help, Klaus has a lot of issues, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Mental Institutions, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Protective Allison Hargreeves, Protective Diego Hargreeves, Protective Luther Hargreeves, Protective Siblings, Racism, Rating May Change, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting, Season/Series 02, Sibling Bonding, Sober Klaus Hargreeves, Soft Diego Hargreeves, Tags May Change, Team as Family, and so do his siblings, anger issues, canon divergence - season 02, homosexuality as mental illness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:00:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 52,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25711747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nishiki/pseuds/nishiki
Summary: The Hargreeves siblings reunite in an unexpected place - and none of them are really all that surprised about it.
Relationships: Allison Hargreeves & Diego Hargreeves, Allison Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves, Allison Hargreeves & Luther Hargreeves, Diego Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves, Diego Hargreeves & Luther Hargreeves, Klaus Hargreeves & Luther Hargreeves
Comments: 175
Kudos: 509





	1. Prolog

**Author's Note:**

> I toyed with the idea of a fic in which all the siblings are inside an asylum for a year now but never really got around to writing it.

The light was burning through his eyelids like a thousand suns. Shadows danced across the white walls surrounding him like a cage, taunting him, moving around him like wolves on the prowl. He was nothing more than a lamb that was sitting around waiting to be torn to shreds by their fangs and claws. He couldn't move as he was lying on the ground. His limbs were constricted by invisible robes around his ankles and knees, his arms and his hands and even if he would be able to, he didn't have the energy. The room around him was spinning and twisting and he didn't quite know where to direct his attention to first. His eyes were rolling around in his skull. He grew aware of the voices around him but they were too faint to actually make out what they were saying. It was a choir of accusations all around him.

His eyes were locked on the face of a man sitting in the same room as he. He was dressed in the uniform of a soldier, a hole ripped through his chest. Stormy blue eyes were looking back at him, a smile never leaving that chiseled face, despite the blood and the sweat and the grime on it. His world was a cacophony of mortar fire and bombs going off in the distance. He could hear the screams of the soldiers as they were being ripped apart limb from limb by grenades and mines.

 _“You told me,”_ The man in front of him said with a smile. _“And I didn't listen.”_

“I’m sorry” Klaus whispered into that white, uncaring void he had been thrown into. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”

 _“Don't listen to him, Klaus,”_ Another voice said but the whirring blades of the helicopters were louder. Someone was screaming for his mother. He was breathing in dust and smoke from the fires of the explosions around him. The air was heavy inside the jungle. It was too hot to even think clearly.

 _“You told me,”_ The man said again. _“You told me. I should have listened.”_

There was a scream ringing in his ears, vibrating in his skull and it took him a while to realize that the sound came out of his own throat. He rolled onto his back, trying to get away from the face of the man or the explosions that were surrounding him. He wanted to put his hands over his ears and make himself into a tight little ball but he couldn't move. He was paralyzed. There were faces looming over him, staring down on him with such malice that it made his stomach turn. 

_“You could have done something,”_ A tall man said as he stared down at him. He was so huge that he would be able to crush him with one of his massive hands without even breaking a sweat. Cold, blue eyes start back at him full with disgust. _“If you wouldn't have been such a waste of space.”_

 _“You got Eudora killed,”_ Another man said and his voice was raw with emotion. _“Because you were a selfish coward.”_

_“You told them my secret.”_ The voice of a boy chimed in - wise beyond his years. _“You ruined everything.”_

 _“You should’ve tried harder!”_ A woman sobbed. _“You should've helped me!”_

He screwed his eyes shut, trying to get away from the chorus of voices in his head but the noise only got louder and his scream tore through the walls and was catapulted out into the real world.

**-End of Chapter 1-**


	2. Chapter 2

**November 1963**

As they dragged him into Holbrooks Sanatorium, he was kicking and screaming. Not without pride, Diego Hargreeves could claim that it took three grown men to overpower him and, in the end, they succeeded only because of the tranquilizer they used on him. He was still groggy and confused as two nurses were manhandling him down a hallway without mercy, his feet dragging across the linoleum floor. It smelled like disinfectant and sickness all around him. He knew where he was right away even as his eyes had troubles staying open. There was no need for the people around him to explain it to him. He didn't need to see the other patients strolling around with confused looks on their faces like proper zombies on drugs. 

The 1960s, he knew, had not been a great time to be locked in a mental asylum and yet here he was, helpless, being dragged around like a puppet. Leave it to him to end up in such a horrifying place. He was shoved into a shower, stripped of his possessions and clothes, and showered with ice-cold water. Before he knew it, he was sitting in the office of a man with glasses staring back at him. Dr. Moncton, the sign on his desk read. He was wearing a brown tweed jacket despite the sweltering heat. 

“Why did you want to kill that man, Diego?” He couldn't recall giving his name to anyone. How much had he said already without realizing it? “Mr. Oswald?” Dr. Moncton asked and Diego had the distinct feeling that he had been asked this question before by this good doctor. His brain was sluggish as he sat there and tried to comprehend what was happening around him. He needed to take stock. That was the first thing to do in a hostage situation. And this right here was probably similar enough. 

He didn't have any weapons but he could make one out of a pen easily enough. He was not handcuffed or tied to the chair he was sitting on. There was no security in this room with him. No window either. The door his only way of escape and undoubtedly at least one nurse with a baton was standing outside that door. Nurses wearing and using batons would be unheard of in his time. He needed to play it safe. 

“I told the police already” Diego drawled but he had trouble forming words. His head felt foggy and time was ticking by either too quickly or too slowly. Nothing really made sense no matter how hard he tried to focus. As he looked at the clock on the wall behind Moncton’s desk, it was 4 PM. He blinked and suddenly ten minutes had gone by. Even if he would find a weapon, he knew now that he would never be able to pull off a great escape right now. Not the way he felt as he was sitting here. “He wants to kill the president…”

“What makes you think that?”

“I just know it … on November the 22nd, 1963 President Kennedy will come to Dallas and he will be shot in his car on his way through Dallas and I am the only person who can save him.”

Again, ten minutes seemed to have ticked by as Dr. Moncton opened his mouth once more to speak. “What makes you think that?”

※※※※※※※

He felt like walking through quicksand as he was being led through the endless maze of corridors. Through one of the windows on his way to the cafeteria, he could see that the sun was already setting. For how long he had stayed at that office, he couldn't say. Maybe Dr. Moncton had probed and prodded Diego like a frog he wanted to dissect. He wasn’t really hungry but, apparently, that was just part of the new routine until he would manage to break out and find a way to save Kennedy. 

He had lost his entire family and there was nothing he could do about that. But he could still save the president of the United States and become a proper hero - even if no one would ever know that he did that. It was enough for him to know. After everything he had been through, he desperately needed a win. So much time he had spent searching for his siblings after landing here, trying to find at least a hint of where they might be or if they were still alive and still there was nothing.

He had landed in Dallas just a couple of days ago - after the end of the world. _The end of the world._ His baby sister Vanya had blown up the moon. Wasn’t that just the joke of the century? Shy, little, awkward Vanya. She had blown up the moon and ended the world - because they had been the world’s shittiest siblings towards her. A part of him wondered if this were just the drugs speaking. Another part of him wondered if it really happened. The line between reality and fiction seemed oddly blurred right now. Was this how Klaus had always felt? It was scary to Diego. 

When the realization that his siblings were probably all dead because Five had messed up big time had settled in, Diego had been on the verge of a nervous breakdown. _Fuck_ . No. He hadn't been on the _verge_ of one. He had been in that bar, drinking himself stupid with grief for his siblings, feeling lost and alone, and with no idea of what to do next before it had come to him. He hadn’t landed in 1963, looked around for his siblings for a bit, and then immediately decided that he might as well kill Lee Harvey Oswald. It hadn’t been this easy.

If he needed to start a new life in 1963 all alone and with no one left to care for, he might as well be a hero, right? That thought had come to him after his sixth Tequila and now a part of him could understand a little better why Klaus always did the crazy shit he had done. The decision had been made at that very moment in time, as he had been sitting in that bar, drinking and thinking about his dead siblings and the new life he was not building for himself with the knowledge of a man from the future. 

And, as a man from the future, he might as well save the president and proof to his old man once and for all that he was a hero - that he could do good and safe people. The possibilities were endless. Maybe he would go on to prevent Chernobyl from happening too! 

He thought about what Eudora had said to him during one of their last ever conversations _‘You want to prove that the things you did with your siblings in those school uniforms was important’_. Maybe she was right. Maybe he needed to prove it to himself. Because, at the end, who was Diego Hargreeves if not a superhero? He had never done anything else. He had run away from home to become a cop and failed and then he had started running around as a vigilante doing exactly what his father had trained him to do as a way to rebel against the old man. 

His life was a clusterfuck. He was a walking, talking inferiority complex. 

Maybe it had just been a matter of time until he would find himself in a mental asylum. It wasn’t really that much of a surprise. In the end, they were all nutjobs, weren’t they? They were all destined to fail, all destined to end up in a place like this, drugged out of their minds. They had failed to save the world. They had failed to save each other. He had failed to save Eudora. He had failed to save his mother. He had failed to protect Klaus. He had failed to help Vanya when she had needed him the most because he had been too busy being a complete asshole towards her.

He was led into the cafeteria and directed towards the food counter where someone handed him a tray and shoved him down the line. The baton on the hips of the male nurses that acted more like security was an always present threat, pushing into the small of his back. Even in his dazed state of mind, he was positive that the nurses wouldn't shy away from using those weapons against him either. Their beady eyes were looking at their patients as if they were _hoping_ for one of them to step out of line for even a second. 

“Next!” A huge lady behind the counter yelled and Diego was shoved forward once more. He stumbled but eventually caught his footing before he watched, mesmerized, how the lady slapped some gross mushy substance onto a plate, and handed it to him. He took it with trembling fingers, placed it on his tray, and walked away. Finally, the press of the baton in the small of his back was gone. He felt free. He felt like he could breathe again. 

A look around had him realize that most tables were already occupied with jittery, confused-looking men and women. Some of them looked as if they had no clue where they were. He noticed a lady talking to the empty space next to her. Another young man was staring up at the ceiling in what Diego could only describe being in awe. Then, as he was allowing his eyes to roam, he stopped at a group of people staring back at him with wide eyes and open mouths. 

For a second, the world stood still and then he almost dropped his tray.

“Klaus” He whispered but there was barely any sound leaving his mouth. “Luther … Allison”

“Get moving!” He was shoved again but this time he was quicker to regain his footing and so he stumbled over to the table, almost running just as Klaus clumsily got off his seat as well. His brother looked different than he had days ago and if it hadn’t been for Luther and Allison by his side, he wouldn't have recognized him. As he reached the table, Diego barely had time to put his tray down. He wanted to hug his brother and he could see it on Klaus’ face that he wanted to do the same but just as Diego went in for the hug, his brother suddenly flinched back, looked at Luther and then quickly sat back down again only to look down on the table instead. Confused about his brother’s demeanor Diego remained standing for a second before he awkwardly sat down at the table. Hurt flashed right through him.

Allison gave him a reassuring little smile as he looked at her in confusion, hoping for an answer for Klaus’ weird behavior. There was a scar on her neck now and the sight made his stomach flop. He could still see her lying in her own blood on the floor of that cabin. He hadn't been there to help her. He hadn't been there to save her. He hadn't been there to protect her. He had been in jail that night. Sitting behind bars because his behavior had made the police think that he was responsible for Eudora’s death. He had sent her to go to Vanya.

He _was_ responsible. 

Luther looked at him with big eyes, almost bulging out of his head. He couldn't deny that he felt hurt by the rejection he had just suffered. And at the same time, he was just endlessly confused and surprised and excited all at the same time. _Here they sat!_ Three of his five siblings. They were alive. And they looked … just as horrible as Diego felt. Klaus’ hair had grown quite long and was a wild, matted mane reaching down to his shoulder blades. He looked sickly thin and pale. Luther looked like he had lost weight too and Allison looked nervous and a bit grey in the face. But they were _here_. They were _alive_. 

“Am I … hallucinating?” He joked quietly but there was not really all that much humor in his voice all things considered. What if he was seeing things now? What if the drugs were making him hallucinate his family? Could he really trust the things he was seeing?

“No” Luther replied quietly. Klaus was still not looking at him and he couldn't tell why. He looked small next to Allison at the table. He noticed how she was grabbing one of Klaus’ thin hands with both of hers to pat him on the back of his hand. 

“I can't believe it” He whispered. “I thought you were all dead.”

“When did you land?” Allison asked. Her voice was raspy and thin as she spoke.

“Just … a couple of days ago. Why? When did you guys arrive here?”

“1961” Allison sighed.

“1962” Luther followed. “Klaus has been here the longest. He landed in 1960. He was already here when we … Uhm … _joined_.”

“So … is it just me or is it really not that much of a surprise that all of us ended up in the nuthouse?” Diego scoffed. Maybe that was exactly where they all belonged. Maybe it had been just a matter of time until they all turned crazy from the things in their past. “Where’s Vanya? Heard anything?”

“No” Allison shook her head just slightly. Klaus, however, remained completely silent and he hated it. Something had happened to render his obnoxious, loud brother into this husk of his former self in a washed-out white in-patient uniform. If Klaus had been thrown into the nuthouse right at the start of all of this mess, he would be here for three years now. _Three years_. 

“We have to be careful” Allison whispered then as he leaned forward on the table just slightly. “With … Uhm … physical contact. The nurses are … rough. Patients are not supposed to be too close, you know?”

Diego nodded. Finally, it started to make sense why Klaus hadn't hugged him, after all.

“They … like to beat the patients.” Luther clarified silently and Klaus ducked his head a little. Even with the drugs that they had given him, he could feel anger flaring up inside of him. Luther’s message was quite clear. 

“How … Why did you guys all end up here?” Suddenly, Luther blushed and Allison came to his rescue.

“Well … I was a … how did they frame it … _Hysterical black woman who ran around in an all-white district._ I suppose … it didn't take more than that for the police to deem me insane.” She laughed even though there was nothing funny about it. 

And, fuck, until now, Diego hadn't even considered his sister’s plight. They landed in the segregated south during a time when racism was still completely normal and even worn as a badge of pride. It was a miracle that his sister was unharmed. He felt himself cramp up at the thought. Until now, he had not even realized how many terrible things could have happened to Allison when she landed here. And yes, of course, he had been at the receiving end of racist behavior before and now that they came to the 1960s it had only gotten worse but that was still not comparable, he thought. At least he had never needed to fear being raped or otherwise molested by racist assholes just because they enjoyed the power they had a little too much. Allison must have been terrified. And having no voice, no power at her disposal … He couldn't imagine it. 

“I couldn't tell them what's going on either - not that they would’ve cared, right? I was in that alley and I was running around looking for you guys. Well … before I knew it, I was here.”

“People complained about me” Luther then shrugged silently. “I went back to that alley too again and again and yelled for you guys. So … When they took me in, I told them who I was, and … they contacted Dad.”

“Dad?” Diego echoed. Maybe it could’ve occurred to him quicker that their father was still alive in this time. Sir Reginald Hargreeves was somewhere out there, living his best life, dreaming up ways to torture his future, superpowered children. He should’ve gone to the city instead. He should’ve gone home and killed the old bastard instead of Lee Harvey Oswald - make him regret everything he would do in the future. The thought that their father was alive and well was nauseating to Diego. 

“Yeah … I mean … we’re in the past … He’s not dead yet.” Luther mumbled quietly. He would have expected him to sound more joyful about the fact that their father wasn’t dead. There was a bitterness to Luther’s voice, though. A bitterness, that made Diego suspect that there was more to this story. “Of course, he told them that he didn't have a son and that I was crazy. I started to fight them and then I ended up in here.”

Diego looked at Klaus but his brother was still staring down on his plate. He was _so fucking thin_. He had always been thin but never like this. It slowly became obvious that Klaus wouldn't speak and before he could ask, Allison cleared her throat and turned back to him. 

“You?”

“Oh … I was … caught _loitering_ in front of the boarding house that Lee Harvey Oswald is residing in. They didn't take too well to me saying that I just wanted to save the president.”

“You … _what?_ ” Luther’s eyes were almost bulging out of his head and Diego felt a smug sense of satisfaction as he realized that Luther had not even thought about saving the president yet - or about all the other possibilities in which they would be able to influence the course of history. 

“Hey! A guy doesn't always get the chance to prevent JFK from being killed! Of course, I would take that chance!”

“Of course” Allison sighed. She sounded exasperated already. Rude. “And … did you?”

“No … His neighbors called the police on me before he came home.” 

“A proper Diego Hargreeves move.” Allison huffed and if it wouldn't have been for the drugs, he would have probably reacted in anger towards her. He couldn't quite deny, however, that this really sounded like one of his usual stupid plans. Like the plan that had gotten Eudora killed. 

“Klaus!” A sharp voice suddenly called out and Klaus, if it was even possible, became even smaller in his seat. “You’re up for your bath now!”

Klaus used to love having a proper bubble bath. He lounged in the tub for eternities, listening to music and just droning out everything else - sometimes much to his siblings’ annoyance. Right now, he looked like he much rather wanted to peel off his skin. 

“It's okay” Luther whispered and leaned across the table to pat Klaus’ hand much like Allison had done before. Klaus hadn't even touched his food as he slowly got up from his chair and staggered out of the room, his shoulders slumped and nothing like the brother he had only seen days ago last. He reminded Diego too painfully of the traumatized and utterly broken young man who had asked to be let out at that veterans’ bar. 

“What happened to him?” Diego asked as Klaus was out of earshot. 

“Uhm” Luther murmured but Allison took over once more. Neither Luther nor Diego had ever been good at talking about uncomfortable situations. They had never learned it, after all. It had never been modeled to them. 

“He was … arrested for indecent behavior.”

“So?” He chuckled. “Wouldn't be the first time.”

“Only that … that we’re in the ‘60s now, Diego.” Allison sighed. “And that his usual bullshit just doesn’t fly here. I don't know the full story either. He doesn't really talk … much.”

“He sometimes goes days without talking.” Luther sighed. “It's bad. He’s retreated into his shell completely. Whatever happened … it was really bad.”

“So far we know only that he was arrested because … well because he made a scene with a young man in a restaurant. Being gay … it's … it's considered a mental illness in this time, Diego. Whatever he did, it got him arrested and then he apparently kept talking to himself - or Ben, rather - and they put him in here.”

“I heard one of the nurses say that they had him in a straightjacket for nearly a solid year and pumped him so full of drugs that he couldn't remember his own name.” He wanted Luther to stop talking. He didn't want to imagine any more about that situation. He couldn't stand thinking about how bad it had been for Klaus. 

“I overheard one of the doctors say that he was considering aversion therapy for him.” He felt his stomach turn at that. He didn't know much about it but what he did know was enough to make him want to vomit already. “When he arrived here … Uhm … one of the patients who was here at the time said … He looked like he had been beaten half to death. Probably in jail. He hardly allows anyone to touch him. But he asked about you a lot. When we came here, he asked if we had seen you. And when we said no and … that there is the possibility that you were dead-”

“He shut down for a solid month” Luther sighed. “Didn't eat or talk at all.”

“Fuck” Diego growled. “ _Fuck!_ ” He slammed his fists on the table and immediately one of the nurses rushed over with his baton in hand. Instead of using it, he grabbed Diego by the neck and slammed him headfirst into the table, narrowly missing the mashed mess on his plate. 

“If you act up again, I’m gonna throw you in the hole!” The nurse threatened before he pushed down on his head and then walked away and left him there to regain his composure. He couldn't help but feel embarrassed about this scene and he felt his cheeks turn hot in shame. To his surprise, Allison reached out to him and gently patted his hand.

“You should eat” Luther pointed at the plate in front of him. “You’ll need your strength.”

Diego sighed but, in the end, he finally took his spoon and took a bite from the glob that was considered food here. It tasted even more awful than it looked like but he forced himself to take another bite regardless. Luther was right. He needed his strength. “There’s one thing I don't understand.” Diego then murmured. “Why didn't you guys break out already? I mean with your guys’ powers and shit? You could have already escaped.”

“The drugs they give us mess with our abilities,” Allison explained. “I can't even properly rumor someone even if I want to any try my hardest. I mean … small things, yes, when they reduce my dosage but … it's not enough to get out.”

“And I’m … hardly stronger than any normal guy with a few muscles at the moment.” Luther shrugged. “The diet they serve us doesn't really help either and I can't work out too, so…”

“We have to get out of here, though,” Diego mumbled. “We have to … We can't stay here forever, right? We have to get out and make sure that JFK doesn't get killed and … for Klaus’ sake.”

“You’re right.” Allison agreed quietly and with a nod. He almost thought that he could see a flicker of hope in her eyes and wondered if he was the cause. They had never been close, the three of them. They were considered the oldest of the seven siblings but they had always butted heads. Now, however, they were banding together. “We have to get out.”

“And how are we going to do this?” Luther asked. 

“I don't know yet. We just … need to make sure that we don't take our meds, I suppose.”

“That's not the best plan.” Allison huffed.

“But it's _a_ plan” Diego sighed. “Come tomorrow, we stop taking our meds and then … we bust out of this hell hole.”

They had never really worked well as a team, the three of them but he could tell by the looks on their faces that they were willing to actually go with his plan now. And he knew why too. They didn't care much about his plan to save Kennedy. They cared about helping Klaus and getting him out of here. Sure, they had all been tired of his antics but neither Allison nur Luther wanted to see Klaus like he was right now either. He was their little brother. Always had been. Always would be. They all wanted their brother to be himself, to be free and happy and not … a drugged-up psycho.

After he was finished eating, he was ushered back out and shown around the most important rooms. They paused shortly at the men’s washroom where he had been earlier for the shower - even though he barely remembered anything about that. Behind another door, however, were the bathtubs and just as Diego glanced through the window in the door, he got a glimpse of his brother sitting in a tub, shivering like a leave in the wind. The water was probably cold and he looked miserable. A nurse was sitting on a chair beside the tub, reading a book. There was nothing he could do about it, though. He forced himself to leave and go to his room even though he wanted nothing more than going in there, pull Klaus out of that tub, and beat the shit out of the person responsible. 

The moment he was in his room, the door was locked from the outside and Diego was left alone, taking stock of his surroundings once more. There was a bed with a white painted metal frame of which the paint was already peeling off in places, a rusty old radiator underneath the barred-up window, a desk shoved against the wall opposite the bed, a small trash can underneath the desk, a wooden chair in front of the desk, and a vent a few inches above the floor that connected his room to the next in the very narrow space between the end of the bed and the door. He couldn't see a ventilator in that space, only the grate on the other side of the wall. Fresh air would come through that hole in the wall. Even if Diego would be able to pry open the grate on his side, the space was much too narrow to squeeze through and go God-knows-where. All in all, the room was tinier than Vanya’s room back at the academy and had more likeness with a broom closet.

He sat down heavily on his bed and the boxsprings creaked underneath his weight. “What a mess” He whispered. “What a fucking mess.”

After sitting like this, not knowing what to do with himself, he could hear the door of the room next to his falling shut and being locked, and then bare feet shuffling across the ugly linoleum floor. He expected to hear the bed creak but then nothing like that happened. A few moments passed and then there was a little knock at the vent on the other side and a paper slipped through the grate. Diego was up immediately and took the paper. It wasn’t hard to identify that scrawly, messy handwriting. 

“Hello neighbor” it read and Diego couldn't help but smile. 

“Klaus” He murmured and sat down next to the vent. “Klaus … how are you?”

There was no response but he could tell that Klaus was sitting right on the other side of that wall. He could just feel it. Suddenly, they were eight years old again and Diego was sitting on the other side of Klaus’ bedroom door on the hallway after Klaus’ special training had left his baby brother afraid and out of his mind. 

“Lights out!” A voice suddenly called through the hallway and a second later the lights in the entire block turned off at once, throwing both brothers into complete darkness. Klaus had always hated the dark. 

“I missed you,” Diego said quietly through the vent. “I thought that you were dead … I thought that I would never see you again. How are they treating you?”

There was silence on the other side again and Diego wanted nothing more than reach through that wall and take his brother’s hand. With a small sigh, he laid down on the ground beside the vent to make it easier on his back. In the darkness, he couldn't see anything of Klaus through that vent but he could hear him breathe and knew that he was close. 

“Remember when we were six and told Ben that there was a monster under his bed? And how he believed us for a month and refused to sleep in his room?”

“He then took revenge” Klaus whispered. “And kidnapped our favorite toys. He held them hostage in the attic.”

Finally, his brother answered him and he chuckled at the memory. “I remember … It took us a stealth mission to get them back and even then he almost caught us.” 

“I’m scared.” Klaus’ voice was thin and he sounded choked up. He could imagine what he looked like right now, sitting pressed against that wall, talking to his brother. It made him ache and want to be in the room with him. 

“I know” He replied quietly even though he was well aware that he had no idea how bad it really was for Klaus. “We’ll get out of here.” 

He could hear him sniffle on the other side and it almost broke his heart into a million tiny pieces. Suddenly, he was glad that Allison and Luther had been here for a little while now. At least Klaus hadn't been alone then. He didn't know what to say or do for a little while but then there was a smile creeping up on his face as he got his head even closer to the vent and started singing _‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’_ in Spanish so quietly only Klaus could hear. They used to jam out to it all the time when they were kids and it first came out. It was the first song that they had learned to play for their stupid little punk-rock band. 

After a while of this, he could hear Klaus breathe out a laugh.

**-End of Chapter 2-**


	3. Chapter 3

The new day came before the sun had time to crawl up on the horizon. Diego was woken up by the electronic buzzing sound of all the doors being unlocked at once and then an overly-cheerful voice coming through the speakers wishing them all a good morning. He needed a moment to understand where he was and then another to understand why he was lying on the ground with his back aching like a god-damn bitch. He must’ve fallen asleep while talking to his brother.

“Klaus” He muttered and tried looking through the vent. He couldn't see anything, though. He didn't hear anything either. 

Slowly, he got to his feet and walked out of his room. He took a moment to orientate himself as he looked up and down the hallway. Some of the other patients were shuffling out of their cells now to go have breakfast. Diego, however, walked over to his neighboring room to have a look inside. Klaus was already gone, apparently. Weird. The room was empty except for the papers that were littering his walls and the floor. His brother’s drawings looked like a fever dream, like something straight out of a massive nightmare. He was catapulted back into his childhood, when he had seen his brother scribbling horrifying images all over his bedroom walls, mumbling fragments of the nightmarish messages the ghosts had given him to himself. 

“Hey” A voice behind him made him jump as he had not even heard someone approach him from behind. As he turned, he was confronted with Luther who smiled at him. How the hell had he not heard his brother approach? “Has Klaus already left?”

“Apparently” Diego sighed. “I have the room next to his. We talked a little last night.”

“He hates being in his room” Luther shrugged. “The moment the doors are unlocked he’s usually out and about.”

“Understandable” Diego sighed and turned away from the room before walking back out. “He never dealt well with being locked up.” Courtesy of their father locking him into a mausoleum - which was something not all their siblings knew about. A secret whispered between two boys in the dark of the night. “He never slept with the door closed either.”

“Come on then, he’s probably already in the cafeteria having breakfast,” Luther said and pointed in the direction of the cafeteria. Then, however, a sheepish expression took over Luther’s face. “I’m sorry for … yesterday. That it was so awkward for you, I mean.”

“Not your fault.” Diego brushed it off, even though the aborted hug was still on his mind. 

“In a way it was.” Luther then sighed. “I told him to be more careful, not to hug one of us and stuff.”

“Why?”

“Last time he hugged someone, he got beaten by the nurses and put in the hole for a week.” He could see the guilt that Luther seemed to feel on his face. It was radiating from his very being. “That was when _I_ came here. And it wasn’t even Klaus initiating the hug but me. They did it just because … the nurses here … they have this power fantasy, you know? Especially when it comes to people like…”

“Klaus.”

“Yes … Or Allison or ... _you_.”

“In other words, they are racist and homophobic.”

“It's the ‘60s, Brother.”

“I start to realize that too.” Diego sighed. “Thanks for watching out for him, though.”

“I just wished I could’ve been here earlier. He went through a lot and I doubt that I know even half of it.” Diego patted his shoulder at that. 

“I’m sure you did what you could.” After all, none of them had asked for being scattered all over the timeline in the 1960s, right? It was Five’s fault. Most likely. It was usually Five’s fault when it concerned jumping through time and messing up in the process. Well, there was always the possibility of Five being dead. It was a possibility that Diego didn't like to entertain but it was still there in the back of his mind. If Five was dead, they would never get a chance to get back to their own time. 

They walked down the hallway to the cafeteria, following the swarm of other patients all headed in that same direction. He caught a glimpse of a young woman with chin-long dark hair and brown skin as she was looking at Diego over her shoulder with huge dark eyes. He was too focussed on his surroundings, however, to really take note of her. He tried to identify possible escape routes for the day they would be ready to leave this hell hole. Maybe he could saw through the bars in front of his window. He would just need something like a shiv or a nail file or something. 

“I hope you are looking forward to arts and crafts today.” Luther suddenly pulled him from his thoughts again.

“What?”

“It's Wednesday. Wednesday is arts and crafts day. We are making bracelets.” 

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Not at all” Luther grinned and showed his left arm where he was wearing an array of different bracelets. Some with wooden beads and some braided with colorful yarn. “This one is from Klaus” He pointed at a crudely braided blue friendship bracelet. A part of him was jealous that Luther had a bracelet that Klaus made for him. It was childish, of course, but that didn't negate the existence of the feeling inside of him.

They entered the cafeteria and he could see Allison sitting at a table and Klaus shuffling over to her with his eyes downcast, his shoulders hunched, and a tray in his hands. He hated seeing his brother like that. Klaus was not meant to be so silent and vulnerable. He was meant to be loud and obnoxious - even though Diego knew better than most other people that all of this had been a facade from the start. Still, he wanted his brother to be colorful and to laugh at the world - not to shuffle around like a mindless zombie, afraid of the nurses and doctors roaming this place. However, sadly, there was nothing he could do about that right now. He could only stick to the plan and try to get them all out of here soon. In the end, he followed Luther to the end of the cue and waited patiently for his food. It took about ten minutes before they were able to join their siblings at their table. 

“Hey” Diego smiled at Allison before looking over at Klaus and winking at him. “I have another question. Why did no one seem surprised to have four people with the same last name and birthday here?”

“Oh” Allison huffed after an initial moment of honest surprise. “I couldn't speak and so I wrote my name down - they got it wrong though. They had me registered as Allison _Hargreaves_ with an ‘a’ instead of a double ‘e’. Klaus didn't give them a last name - the birthday thing is just a coincidence in their eyes.”

“Clearly, the people here are true professionals.”

“Clearly.” Allison laughed. “Hey, looking forward to arts and craft today?” Without even knowing, Allison repeated the same question Luther had asked earlier. She then turned to Klaus and it didn't escape Diego how motherly she sounded. “You love arts and crafts, don't you?” 

Klaus nodded and pushed his food around on the plate. It looked just as tasteless as last night so he couldn't really blame his brother for not wanting to eat anything. He noticed that girl from before again, staring at him as she was chewing on a piece of bacon. In all honesty, she looked like a serial killer with that intense stare she had going on. Allison followed his glance and rolled her eyes. 

“Ignore her.” She muttered. “That's Lila. She’s bad news. No matter what she says to you, Diego - she's a pathological liar, okay? She already tried to manipulate both Klaus and Luther to do things for her.” 

“What kind of things?”

“Stupid stuff” Allison sighed. “Getting the things she wanted and shit, helping her during her tasks and stuff and getting them in trouble. She acts all quirky and friendly but there’s something in her that is giving me the heebie-jeebies.” 

“Yeah” Luther agreed. “I have to agree on that with Allison. She’s creepy.”

“Maybe” Klaus suddenly said out of the blue and started chewing at his thumbnail. “She was sent by the commission to spy on us … maybe they still want Five.” 

“Good point” Luther nodded. “We need to be vigilant. No matter what she wants, she can’t know that we are siblings. The doctors would probably separate us.” 

“Gotcha.” It made sense to separate family members from each other in an environment like this. After all, they would be able to influence the effect of the treatment they each received, right? Then again, who would believe them if they would say that they had all been adopted from around the world by an eccentric billionaire? Even if they would leave out the eccentric billionaire part of the whole story. It would still sound fabricated that they were of the same family and by accident, all ended up here. Of course, it sounded only fabricated for those who didn't know their family. 

“Do you think we should … contact Dad again when we are out of here?” Luther turned to them with the stare of a schoolboy looking for answers from his parents. “I mean if we could maybe get his proper attention we could explain everything to him. We just need to get him to listen and tell him something only we would know, right?”

“Do you still think _Dad_ will help us?” Diego groaned. It was so easy to fall back into old patterns and habits around his siblings. He felt as if they had had this conversation only days ago. The fact that Luther was still banking on their father for help and advice was baffling to him. “Luther, you can't be serious!”

“No … I don't mean it like that” He sighed and looked suddenly very flustered. “It's that … We need to start _somewhere_ , right? Like a base of operations or something. And maybe we should all go back home and hope that Five and Vanya will get there as well. What else is there to do for us? We can’t stay in Dallas, that much is certain. They are going to search the whole city for us as soon as we manage to break out.”

“Yeah, I agree.” Even he could admit when his brother Luther had a point. They would be ‘Dallas’ most wanted’ when they would break out. Four crazy and possibly dangerous people on the run. “And if the Commission _is_ after us … the house would truly be our best chance.” 

And he hated it. He hated the thought of meeting Dad again. It actually scared him. However, just thinking about meeting his father once more made him feel like a scared little boy again. And yet, that would be his big chance to prove to the old man that he was a hero - without him or the academy. He was a hero in his own right. Then again … would his father really be that impressed by that? He didn't know anything about them, after all. Knowing his father, Reginald would probably not care about any of this.

“After breakfast, it's time for the meds,” Allison said, changing the topic. She was talking in a hushed whisper, her tone low so that no one would be able to overhear her words. “They will ask you to open your mouth and show them that you swallowed your pills. You’ll need to shove them into your cheek where they can’t see it - then you spit them out as soon as you can.” 

“Hargreeves, Diego!” A voice called out for him as if the nurse had heard their conversation. Diego gave his siblings a brief nod. “See you for _arts and crafts_ then, I suppose.” Again, he winked at Klaus before he got up, took his tray with his half-eaten food to put it away before he went to the nurse’s desk to receive his meds in a small plastic cup. 

It was exactly like Allison had told him, he was expected to show that he had swallowed his pills, so he pushed them as deeply as he could into his cheek, opened his mouth and lifted his tongue as he was ordered to. The nurse, a very stern-looking middle-aged woman who wore her hair in a very tight updo and reminded him a little too closely for comfort of the famous Nurse Ratched, looked at him with a frown and took her sweet time to decide that she was satisfied but, in the end, she nodded. 

“Dr. Moncton wants to see you in his office” Nurse _Ratched_ then told him and pointed down the hallway. “After that, you are expected to join art therapy.”

“Roger” Apparently, trying to be funny was the wrong approach in this nuthouse because the nurse, who’s name tag actually read ‘Jenkins’, didn't even crack a slight smile when he saluted her. So, thoroughly denied and with a sigh, Diego turned away from Nurse Jenkins’ desk and walked down the hallway towards the office of Dr. Moncton. 

Even if he wouldn't have been to the office only yesterday, there was no way that Diego would not find his way to Moncton’s office - not when he had one of the nurses following him and steering him in the right direction. Well, this should’ve been expected. He was a crazy man who used to carry around all kinds of knives, after all. 

It would be the understatement of the century if Diego would say that he wasn’t really looking forward to talking to Moncton again. He barely recalled the things they had talked about yesterday, thanks to all the drugs and sedatives they had pumped into him. Still, he walked over to Moncton’s office like a good boy. If he would be on his best behavior he might just get out of here, right? After a short knock, he was allowed inside the office. Dr. Moncton smiled at him as he walked inside and offered him a seat right away on a comfortable looking leather sofa. Diego, however, didn't even remember this sofa from yesterday. Moncton’s office was filled with books and decorative little items strewn across the room - little trinkets that he had collected over the years, photos with famous and semi-famous people, diplomas, and all sorts of nicknacks. 

“How was your first day?” Dr. Moncton said airily as a way to start a conversation that would probably soon become very serious just by the nature of Moncton’s business. “It came to my attention that you made friends already. I’m glad to see that.”

“Yeah” Diego shrugged one shoulder in response, trying to play it down as much as he could without giving away too much. He felt like he was already being looked at through a microscope and it reminded him too much of the way his father had looked at him. Diego had never thrived under circumstances like these and he had never been a good liar either - mainly because he had always thought that his father was able to see right through his lies. “They’re nice. I didn't know where to sit and they told me to sit with them.”

“Very good,” He nodded. “They are making great progress, all three of them. But we don't want to talk about _them_ now, right? How are _you_ feeling today, Diego?”

“Good … I feel … good. Still a little confused why I’m here.”

“Diego” Ah, there was that voice that sounded like Dr. Moncton was talking to a complete lunatic, he had wondered when it would come. The worst part about all of this was that, this voice too, sounded exactly like the one his father would employ when talking to Diego - especially after he had stuttered his way through a lesson. “You wanted to _murder_ an innocent man. You waited in front of his boarding house until he would come home so that you could do the deed. It's a godsend that his neighbors called the police on you.”

“He is going to kill the president!” Diego growled in response, anger flaring up inside of him again. He had been so close to actually stopping this man before the police had come to the place. Of course, they had taken one look at him and the knives that he had strapped to his body before taking him in. “Why is no one listening to me?”

“Diego, we should talk about your anger issues.”

“My … _what?_ ”

“Yesterday, I got the impression that you are a very angry young man, Diego. It took three men to get you here and I ask myself what made you this way.” _Oh no._ “Let's talk about your childhood, okay?”

“I’d rather not.” Diego huffed in response to that rather cliché question. “My childhood was not exactly sunshine and rainbows, Doc.”

“Yes, I gathered as much.” Moncton chuckled, still patient with Diego’s attitude. Well, he had to be. He had probably seen worse than Diego. “Tell me about it. Let’s start with your mother.”

“My mother was a saint” He responded immediately - perhaps even a little too quickly, all things considered. The way Moncton cocked an eyebrow did not escape him either. “She was one of the best things in my life, Doc. And no, I don't have an Oedipus complex. She was the only good thing in this house besides my siblings. She always cared for us but she couldn't protect us from our dad.”

“Let's talk about your father then.”

“Do we have to?” He knew that he wouldn't get out of this situation without discussing Reginald. Even if he would decide to play the petulant child and not say anything at all to Dr. Moncton in response to his questions, sooner or later he would need to answer him. Right now, all he could hope for was that his siblings had not told similar stories to this man. Fuck, they should have gotten their stories straight first. 

“I think it would benefit your rehabilitation greatly, Diego.”

“My father was a monster, Doc.” He decided to say. Since he was a bad liar, maybe his best strategy would be to stick to the truth as much as possible. “My childhood was an experiment for him. My siblings and I were nothing more than lab rats for him. And that is all there is to say about him.”

“Did he beat you?”

“Whenever he thought it was necessary to make me behave the way he wanted.” Diego shrugged. “When we, my siblings and I, didn't function the way he expected us to, he would beat us with his cane like we were nothing more than a bunch of malfunctioning toys. We were punished when we would talk during mealtimes. We were punished when we would dare to have fun outside of the designated time for fun and games. We were punished when we got sick. I used to have a stutter as a kid. He made fun of me for it, demeaned me whenever he possibly could, put me on the spot for it.”

“There is a lot to unpack there, Diego,” Moncton said and looked at him with what Diego could only describe as sincere curiosity. Once again, he was a specimen underneath a microscope. Moncton was scribbling down notes in the same fashion his father used to do. The only difference between Reginald and Moncton was that Moncton didn't seem interested in harming him in any way. Maybe Moncton was not as much of a Frankenstein character as Reginald was. 

“You think?” He scoffed and started fidgeting with one of the pillows on the couch. He really missed having his knives. Usually, he would be twirling a knife between his fingers now. Much like Klaus, he liked to busy his hands.

“Tell me about your siblings then.” Moncton changed the topic with a smile. “You said that they were the best thing in your life besides your mother. How many siblings do you have?”

“We were seven” Diego sighed after a moment of hesitation. He had to be careful now. He couldn't give away too much. Him being here, him spending time with his siblings as much as possible was already risky as it was. What if Dr. Moncton would notice the tattoo that they all shared? Maybe he already had. “Five boys and two girls. Later, one of my brothers died and that … that tore us all apart, pretty much. We all left home shortly after that. Our dad … he blamed us for our brother’s death. Maybe he was right, I don't know.”

“How did he die?” Moncton was tapping his pen against his notebook, one hand supporting his chin as if he was lost in deep thought. Was he already seeing through Diego and his story?

“It was an accident.” He lied. “Car crash when he just turned seventeen. Dad blamed us for not stopping our little brother from using the car that night, so … yeah, father of the year.”

“Were you close?”

“Sure.” He replied, thinking of his dead brother. He missed Ben dearly every day of his life. At least now he knew that Ben was still around, after the stunt that Klaus had pulled at the Icarus Theater. That didn't make it better but at least it gave him a sort of comfort. Ben was there and he was probably watching over Klaus. He wondered if Klaus was still able to see him despite the drugs he was forced to take. “Not as close as I am with my youngest brother but we were close, yes. His death broke something inside of me - inside all of us.” 

And there it was again, this deep-seated anger that was living inside of him and never quite vanished. He could still see his brother Ben lying in his own blood on the ground, unmoving, ripped apart by his own power. He could still hear his father’s booming voice scolding them for Ben’s death - never accepting responsibility for it himself. He wanted to get up and destroy the fancy trinkets that Dr. Moncton was collecting like his father used to collect his own fancy trinkets from all over the world. He barely even noticed how he had started bobbing his right leg in agitation. 

“Losing someone you love is always hard,” Moncton said. “How long ago was that?”

“Thirteen years,” Diego muttered as he pulled himself out of his dark thoughts. “But it still hurts like it was just yesterday.”

“We will talk about that and about your father some more soon,” Moncton promised as if that was something Diego should be looking forward to. “You talked about another brother. Tell me about him.”

“I don't know what to say about him,” He shrugged. He had never been really good with words and not just because of his stammer. To Diego, words didn't come as easy as they came to Klaus or Allison. He had always had a hard time expressing himself verbally, never seemed to find the right words to use. Talking to Moncton was draining already. “I always felt protective of him.” He then said. “Dad was worse to him than he was to me. He locked him up sometimes and forced him to _‘confront his fears’_ without mercy. My brother often came to me at night when he couldn't sleep or had nightmares. So, yeah, we were pretty close. I love him a lot. But after the death of our brother, he ran away and he got addicted to drugs and alcohol. I spent a lot of time looking for him, trying to make sure he was okay. I’m always worried about him.”

“You have a deeply caring nature.” Dr. Moncton said after a moment of pause and after he had noted down a few things. 

Almost, Diego expected to hear his father’s reprimanding voice calling him weak, calling him a momma’s boy in disgust. Having a _‘deeply caring nature’_ was not exactly what Reginald wanted or encouraged. He had raised them to be cold and indifferent towards each other and most other people they would come across. Being kind and caring had been a weakness that needed to be destroyed at the root in the eyes of Reginald Hargreeves. So, in essence, he was surprised as there was no cruel comment following Moncton’s words. 

“But you are a very angry young man, Diego.” He scoffed but Moncton continued as if he hadn’t heard it. “You are not a lost cause, though. I think we will be able to make good progress in time. I wonder why you think that the president is going to be killed, Diego. And I wonder why you think it is upon _you_ to prevent something like this from happening.”

“Someone has to do the right thing, Doc. Someone has to do the good thing.”

“And why do you think that _you_ need to be this man?”

“Because no one else will do the right thing.” He growled. It was obvious, wasn’t it? How could Moncton work in this field and not see it? “No one. People just stand by and watch the horrors that are sweeping our world and they do nothing about it! Nobody ever does anything. So yes, I have to be the guy who does the right thing! I have to be the guy who watches out for his junkie brother in the streets and I have to be the guy who helps those in need. And I also have to be the guy who prevents the president from getting killed in a few months because no one else will!” 

Dr. Moncton looked at him over the rim of his glasses with an expression that Diego couldn't quite read. It wasn’t _good_. That much he could tell right away. He had said the wrong thing. He could almost see it in his eyes. _Delusions of grandeur, hero-complex, paranoia_.

“Doc” He tried again, this time a bit more insistent, followed by a hesitant smile that probably only served to make him look even crazier than he sounded. “I know that it sounds crazy but - it is the truth. You have to believe me. This man, Lee Harvey Oswald, is going to kill the president when he comes to visit Dallas in November.”

“We will talk about it more during your next visit.” Moncton then said and closed his notebook with an audible _thud_ as if drawing a line under this conversation. “I’m afraid our time is up now and you are expected to join your first art therapy.”

He wanted to object but then he frowned and nodded before getting up. "Sure, Doc." He muttered and walked to the door. "See you later." 

Maybe, he thought as he walked down the hall a few minutes later, he shouldn't have opened up so quickly to the doctor. But maybe he would get more lenient with Diego if he would be at his best behavior. Even if that meant swallowing down his anger and actually talking about his issues. And ' _issues_ ' he had. A whole shopping list of them. He knew that. He was man enough to recognize that he was just as damaged as Klaus and Luther were. He could do that. For his siblings. He knew how to be obedient. He had learned it the hard way. He could do it again. 

He reached the art therapy room and saw his siblings sitting at a table that was farthest away from the door. A few other patients were roaming around the room. Some of them had actual easels they stood at and painted on actual canvases, some of them were drawing with crayons. No sharp objects for those people. Before he could join his siblings, however, that woman that he had seen earlier, Lila, suddenly stepped in his path. 

"Do you think that there are things that cannot be explained?” She asked completely out of the blue, staring at him with huge bug-eyes, unblinking. “I mean take yogurt for example. How does it know to stop being milk?"

"Diego!" Luther called and waved as if he had not yet seen them. And, really, how would one be able to overlook someone like Luther?

"Are those party poopers your friends?" Lila asked, shooting a quick glance over her shoulder at the table where his siblings waited for him.

"Yes," He said briskly and tried walking past her but Lila stepped into his path yet again.

"I could be your friend" He got what Allison meant before. She was giving him the creeps - and she had yet to blink. “I am much more fun to be around” She grinned as she dragged a finger down his cheek. He took a step to the side at that. Briefly, just for a second, he thought about Eudora. He could still see her lying in that motel room on the dirty carpet. It had been his fault and he would never be able to forget that he had killed her. Why those thoughts crept up on him at that exact moment was beyond him but once in there, he could do nothing to shake the images of Eudora lying in a pool of her own blood out of his head again.

“Sorry but that’s a hard pass on that.” He said and then finally succeeded in walking past her and moving over to the table his siblings sat at. In a plastic bowl in the center of the round plastic table, waited thousands of colorful wooden beads for them, next to it was a roll of black elastic band and one scissor that was attached to the table by a thin cord. 

“I’m surprised they give us scissors.” He commented and sat down beside Luther.

“They are very blunt.” Allison chuckled in response as Klaus was already working on making yet another bracelet. He was working diligently, using decorative little knots in between beads. For a moment, Diego thought back to their childhood when Klaus had spent hours and hours painting or drawing in his sketchbook. Klaus had always been artsy but he didn't seem to enjoy this task very much.

“It's pretty mind-numbing,” Klaus then murmured. “How was your chat with the doc?”

It was the most Klaus had talked since Diego arrived at the hospital. Not even last night his brother had said that much. “It was annoying.” He sighed. “He wanted to talk about my childhood. The usual crap.”

“Not about your anger issues?” Allison teased.

“Yes, that too- Hey what do you mean, anger issues?” He then huffed. For the first time since arriving in 1963, he felt a little more at peace, and wasn't that just miraculous? He was sitting in a mental asylum, making pearl bracelets with three of his siblings and yet he felt oddly at peace with these latest developments

At least, he thought, he knew where three of his siblings were. At least, he thought, they were safe here with him. At least, he thought, he wasn’t all alone.

**-End of Chapter 3-**


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Diego and Klaus both have a not good very bad day

Dr. Moncton's eyes bore into his very soul as Klaus sat on the comfortable leather couch inside his office like he had so many times before in those past three years he had already spent here. He was clutching his hands in his lap and tried to avoid looking at the man. He felt like Dr. Moncton was able to tell what he was thinking when he would look at him for too long. Maybe he had powers too. Maybe he was one of the other thirty-six children born October 1st, 1989 and he too had traveled back in time and was not stuck here. No … No, maybe that didn't make much sense … did it?

His brain felt as if it was stuffed with cotton. He didn't recall ever feeling like that. Not even on heroin. Half the time, he didn't know if he was voicing his thoughts, that was why he tried to keep his mouth shut as much as possible. That was why he so often bit his tongue. He couldn't risk anything to slip out. He needed to be careful with the things he said - or with the things he thought because Dr. Moncton was a mind reader.

“Klaus?” Dr. Moncton’s voice made him flinch in his seat and curl around himself a little more. It took him a few seconds and two steadying breaths before he carefully looked at the man without turning his head in Moncton’s direction. He could see him sitting behind his desk, watching him over the rim of his glasses like a hawk, a notebook in front of him, and a pencil in his hand. For a second, he was sure that he was back in his father’s office, ready to be evaluated, ready to be dissected. He wondered where he would put the incision this time, which organ he would pull out to examine. “Klaus, are you with me?”

He nodded sharply. “Yes, Sir.”

“Klaus, I told you that there is no reason to call me Sir.” Moncton smiled but Klaus was still careful. He had learned his lesson. In the beginning, he had been mouthy and sarcastic and he had suffered accordingly. People in institutions like this were not too keen on people talking back or trying to be funny. At least the nurses were not and they made it known that they had no patience for any kind of bullshit. 

“Okay” Moncton then said. “Last time we ended our session talking about this fantasy you had about serving in the Vietnam war.”

“It’s not a fantasy” He bit out and pressed the heels of his hands into his forehead. His head hurt so badly. He felt disoriented and weak. There was a phantom lingering about at the edge of his field of vision but he couldn't make out the details. Every time he tried to look at it more clearly, it was wavering and then vanishing into thin air. He felt like he was supposed to know what it was but he just couldn't quite put his finger on it.

“Klaus” The man sighed. “You didn't fight in the war. You would be there in the thick of it right now if you did. And you didn't fight in any other war either. You’re a lucky man, Klaus.”

“You wouldn't say that if you would know what my life is like, Doc.” The moment he said those words, he regretted them and wished he would be able to go back a few seconds to bite his tongue instead. 

“Let’s talk about it then.”

“Doc…”

“You’ve been here for almost three years now, Klaus,” Dr. Moncton said as if that had to mean anything or as if Klaus hadn't counted the days whenever he had been lucid enough to do so. “And so far, we have made only little progress.”

“Maybe I am a hopeless case, Doc.” Klaus offered with a lopsided smile. 

“I don't think so, Klaus.” Of course, he would find the one psychiatrist that never lost hope even in the most hopeless of cases. Moncton had been watching him for three years and he had yet to understand that Klaus was a complete waste of space and resources - that it would be more efficient to lobotomize him and let him live out the rest of his days as a vegetable. After all, he had not even managed to save the man he loved from being killed in the war. “You’ve become a lot calmer already and you follow the rules, you are kind and friendly to the other patients. Your record is flawless in those social aspects.”

“But unfortunately I am still a queer and batshit crazy, right?” His words actually prompted a small chuckle to escape the good doctor. What a fucking miracle.

“Not how I would frame it,” Moncton said as calmly as ever. Sometimes he wanted to provoke this man to finally lose his shit on him - like he did with Reggie. Though with Reggie it had been comically easy. “We have made almost no progress with your issues in three years, Klaus. You still tell wild stories about the Vietnam war, about time travel, about being a superhero who can commune with the dead, about this academy you have been raised in with six other superpowered children and an abusive father, a mother who is a robot, and a talking chimpanzee named Pogo.”

“Yeah, and it's all true!”

“Klaus” He sounded exasperated now. Well, that definitely was one step in the right direction of getting the man to lose his shit. “You have to see … you have to understand that what you are saying sounds crazy, do you?”

“But just because it sounds crazy, it doesn't make it any less true.” He groaned in frustration even though showing his frustration had never benefited him in this place. They tended to sedate him or bind him to his bed when he would get frustrated. “What do you expect me to do, Doc? Would you rather have me say that I understand that everything I said was a lie or delusion and then you send me on my merry way?”

“No, Klaus.” Moncton sighed. “I need you to fully _understand_ it. You need to grasp it and heal from your illness. The same goes for your … infatuation with other men.”

“I’m afraid that there is nothing you could do about that, Doc.”

“I already offered you to try aversion therapy. Klaus, you must see the error of your ways, right? The perversion you fell for. I don't blame you.” His voice was all warm and understanding as he said these things. He was talking to Klaus like a father - a real father - would talk to his son after a nightmare. Well, his whole entire life was a nightmare, so that checked out. “These days … with all the rock’n’roll music, with hippies preaching about free love and peace while better men die in the trenches in Vietnam, with all the sex and sin on TV and the music - a young man like you has to be corrupted and confused by it. It's not your fault. But we can do something about it. You want to get better, don't you? You want a normal, fulfilling life, don't you?”

“A white picket fence, a wife, a dog named Bob, and 2.5 kids?”

“Yes, why not?” Moncton smiled as if it should be obvious that Klaus would want something like this because everyone wanted something like this. 

“I think I like my perversion better, Doc.” He muttered. “At least I’m myself then. At least I’m not living a lie then.”

“There comes the time, Klaus, when you will no longer have a say in your treatment. Usually, patients are not asked for their consent in this regard. You have been here for almost three years now and although you only rarely have violent or manic episodes anymore, my superiors want to see progress. It's on you to decide whether you want to actually work on your problems or not now. You wouldn't want to make me put you up for electroconvulsive therapy again, do you?” 

“No!” He spat. “No, Doc! I-I … O-Okay … I’m … I’m trying, Doc. I-I d-do anything.”

“Good to hear, Klaus” Moncton sighed as if he had not expected this outcome and as if he was not just signing Klaus’ fate. “I will schedule you for tomorrow morning for your first aversion therapy session. You’ll see, Klaus, you’ll get out of here if you keep up the good work and you will lead a normal, healthy life.”

※※※※※※※

“Hey Superman” He flinched at the sound of the voice of one of the male nurses, Jeff, as he grinned at him from where he was leaning against the wall. Klaus needed to get past him if he wanted to go back to the common room. The common room where he would be safe because he would see his siblings there. He could go to his own room instead, of course. He wouldn't need to go past this man then. He hated being in his room, though. Years ago, he wouldn't have hesitated to walk up to the man, say something rude or borderline flirtatious, and walk away. He had never been shy about taking risks. Dangerous situations had just added a bit of flavor to his life. Right now, however, he was almost frozen with fear at the sight before him.

“Are you deaf now too?” Jeff laughed and Klaus forced a grin on his face. It felt hollow and false. A poor imitation of what the old Klaus had been like.

“Just using my x-ray vision to look at you naked, darling.” He added a sharp whistle and a wink. That was what old Klaus would have done, right? “And boy, oh boy what can I say? The Mrs. sure is happy with the package you carry.”

He expected aggression and anger, so he wasn't all that surprised when Jeff left his spot on the wall and immediately came down the hall towards him with his baton in hand like an enraged bull. It really didn't take much to anger men like him. If he wouldn't think it was borderline suicidal, he would claim that Jeff and men like him only reacted so badly to men like Klaus because they were so deep in the closet that they almost reached Narnia. 

“Why, why!” Another, very much melodic, voice suddenly chimed in. “Nurse Parker, we wouldn't want to beat up a patient just because we can’t handle a bit of a joke now would we?”

Lila stared at them with those big dark eyes. If _he_ was crazy, _she_ was a complete psycho. She had this creepy weird stare that always gave him the shivers - _Him_ , a man who was used to seeing corpses all the time. She grinned in amusement as she caught a glimpse of Klaus looking back at her, as if this situation was exciting to her, or as if this was all just a game. She was like a shark, the way she stared at him and he was, if anything, barely a goldfish. It wasn’t like he was afraid of her, perse. He was just wary since no one seemed to have a clue why she was here in the first place. She seemed weirdly dangerous to Klaus and he just couldn't help thinking that. 

“Go back to the others, Pitts!” The man groaned, the baton still in his hand and ready to strike Klaus if he or Lila would make one wrong move. “This is none of your business.”

“Oh, but I really think that Dr. Moncton wouldn’t be too happy to see that you are threatening one of his patients for no reason!” 

Jeff seemed to hesitate for a moment or two but, in the end, he put the baton away and walked away from Klaus with a sneer on his face. “I’m warning you, faggot - you know what I can do to you if you’re not a little more careful. My buddies and I just ache to teach you a lesson.”

With those words, he walked past Klaus but not without shoving him in the shoulder first. Lila took her chance to sneak up closer towards him as Klaus stood stiffly and listened to the squeaking footfalls of Nurse Parker’s sneakers on the ugly linoleum floor. His heart was racing inside his chest and he felt ridiculous for it. 

He had been experimented upon his whole life. He had been raised as a lab rat. He had been living on the streets for the better part of thirteen years, being constantly high, selling his body and soul, and whatever else he could sell in exchange for heroin and cocaine on dirty street corners. He had been in prison, been beaten, and taken advantage of. He had fought alongside his siblings to stop the end of the world. He had been tortured by time-traveling assassins and then traveled to the ‘60s where he had been beaten again and thrown in jail and then sent here. He should be strong and resilient but he was just … exhausted. Too exhausted to be resilient, perhaps. Too exhausted to not be afraid of Parker and the others. Because he knew what they could do to him in the dark of the night and he knew that they would do it too. It was a power-thing and men without power in their life, craved power over those weaker than them, over those who were below them.

He felt like he couldn't breathe properly. His chest was tight and his hands shaking. He could hear the voices again, desperate for his attention - phantoms creeping across the walls of the hallway like shadows, calling out for him relentlessly. _Klaus! Klaus! Klaus!_

“Here” Suddenly, there was a plastic cup filled with water in front of his face. At least he hoped it was water. Maybe it was vodka. He would give an arm and a leg for a bottle of vodka right now. 

“Fireworks…” He muttered to himself without much rhyme or reason. Sometimes what he said didn't make any sense to him either. He was the mad hatter and he had missed the tea party. Then again none of the things the people around him said made much sense either, right? Nothing in his life had ever made any sense. 

“No, it’s water” Lila huffed and shoved the cup into his trembling hands. He almost dropped it and he needed her help to actually lift the cup and take a sip. “Drink up. The whole thing, come on. You look like you need it.”

He did. He was incredibly thirsty all of a sudden. He downed the cup so quickly that water was actually running out at the sides of his mouth and down his chin and neck.

“There’s a good boy” Lila grinned as she took the cup away from him again as it was empty.

“I don't need your help” He muttered even though clearly he had just accepted her help. Well, a drowning man would accept the help of his worst enemy too. Not that Lila was his enemy. It was just … She was so close now. He was scared. “I don't like you.”

“Oh wow, rude!” She laughed. “I don't much like you either!”

“What? What's not to like?” He said on autopilot and opened his arms wide to his sides because it was something the old Klaus would have done. “I’m clearly … a joy to be around.”

“Yeah, obviously.” She huffed. “I always wondered how a trust-fund baby like you fell off the wagon. What's your story?”

“Oh wow, presumptuous much?” He scoffed. He remembered the news articles after they had all left the mansion. The tabloids had spent years checking up on the Umbrella kids, informing the general public where they were and what they were doing. That was only one reason why Diego was kicked out of the police academy. He remembered, however, the articles about himself - those scandalous headlines and the accompanying unflattering photos of the junkie of the Hargreeves family. People, much like Lila now, had asked the same question again and again. How could he have fallen so low? And yet, no one had really been interested in the answer. “Who's to say that I am not the child of a traveling circus and spent the last fifteen years of my life traveling across the country in a beat-up van with my pet goat Steve and a goldfish named Carmicle?”

“Because you look like a trust fund baby” She grinned and suddenly took one of his hands to examine his palm and the tips of his fingers. “Like a guy who has not worked a day in his life. Look, no calluses or anything.”

“I assure you that I have worked plenty.” He hissed and yanked his hand away from her grip again. 

“I didn't mean as in selling your ass.” She grinned wickedly and Klaus was taken aback by that. 

“Judgmental - nice.” He hissed.

“Hey, I’m not at all judging you! You did what you had to, right, Princess?” He felt weird all of a sudden. Like his entire world was starting to warp and fall apart. The phantoms around him started to take much clearer shape around him and their chanting became more and more intrusive and louder. He was feeling sick. “I mean, rebelling against your old man sometimes asks for whoring yourself out, right?”

He didn't know what came over him. He couldn't explain it either. Suddenly, rage was welling up inside of him like a living, breathing creature. It became so overpowering and violent, that he couldn't think straight anymore. Anger consumed his whole being and he stood no chance against it. His throat burned as if he was yelling but he wasn't really saying anything, was he? 

_KLAUS! KLAUS! KLAUS!_ The phantoms screeched in his ears. There was screaming all around him. The world was loud. Everything was so loud. Mother Earth herself was wailing in his ears and his head felt like it was about to explode. A soldier stood right in front of him with a grin on his face and the blood of his nephew on his uniform as he chanted _‘Do it! Hit the queer!’_.

Suddenly, he was on the ground, and then sharp pain exploded at the side of his skull. He heard another voice scream out his name but his world already turned dark.

※※※※※※※

Inside the common room, it was just as noisy as it always seemed to be. Even after only being here for a couple of days, Diego was already certain that he would always be able to recognize these sounds and that he would never get them out of his mind. The old, black and white TV with the rabbit ears was running in the corner where a couple of patients were sitting on an old, beat-up leather couch. Some of them were staring with fascination at the cartoon that was on, others were talking - either to another patient or thin air. Sometimes it was hard to tell. Near the window, an old guy with soup stains all over his patient uniform was playing chess against himself. He was always switching sides, hurrying around the table as if he needed to make sure his opponent couldn't get the upper hand and cursing up a storm when a move of his invisible opponent was not to his liking. Two women were playing a board game and seemed mostly peaceful while going at it. In the common room, it was always loud.

He was sitting on one of the newer couches in the reading nook of the common room - even though none of them was reading. Allison had just left them to attend group therapy, reminding Diego how glad he was that he had not yet needed to attend this bullshit. Talking to Moncton was bad enough. A few minutes ago, he had seen Lila leave the room to do god-knows-what. Not that he cared. It was afternoon by now and Diego still had his first group therapy session coming later. “What do you even talk about in group therapy?”

“If you’re lucky you don’t get called to say anything” Luther huffed. “It's a bit like when we had math with Dad, remember? You _don't want_ to be called.” How could Diego forget any class that their father had taught them? Pogo had been strict with them, yes, their private tutors stuffy and boring. But Dad … Reggie had been on another level. Just then as he wanted to say something in response to his brother’s words, there was commotion coming from down the hallway. Someone started shouting, then screaming, then nurses were rushing into the hall. A moment too late he recognized one of the screaming voices.

“Klaus!” Luther and he said at the same time without sharing as much as a glance. A sick deja vu to the night he had found Eudora dead in that motel room. His fault. 

Diego all but jumped over the backrest of the couch that he had been sitting on and ran towards the hallway the screaming came from without thinking twice about it. He saw Klaus on top of Lila on the ground, clawing at her, screaming like a complete lunatic - different languages all coming toppling out of his mouth as if he was possessed by a demon. He saw Lila trying to shield her face from the attack and then one of the nurses took a swing with his baton at Klaus’ head.

“No!” Diego yelled. “Klaus! Leave my brother alone!” He noticed too late that Dr. Moncton had come out of his office and witnessed the scene unfold. The mistake had already been made. The deed was done.

“Diego, no!” Luther yelled but he couldn't stop him as Diego rushed towards the nurse that had attacked Klaus. He tackled the man to the ground and before he knew what was happening, there was a sharp prick in his neck and his world became blurry before fading out completely. 

※※※※※※※

He knew the circular room he was in the moment he managed to open his eyes against the heaviness that was weighing down his eyelids. He knew the white ceiling and the tiled walls and the checkered linoleum floor. He knew the bed he was lying on. He knew the leather straps that were holding him in place on the bed. His wrists and ankles were fastened to the bed frame, there was a strap across his chest, across his pelvic, across his thighs.

He could feel the electrodes pressing into the skin of his forehead and the rubber between his teeth. He remembered lying in his father’s lab just like this. He remembered being experimented upon by the old man without mercy. He remembered being probed and prodded with needles and syringes. He remembered Pogo scribbling in his notebook, adamant to not look at the child on the bed in the middle of the room. He remembered his father talking like he wasn’t there. 

Someone leaned over him and he tried blinking against the loud neon light that was shining down on him without mercy. He could make out the gleam of the monocle, his father’s uncaring eyes, and the sharp lines of his angular face. He tried pleading with him but his tongue was heavy in his mouth and the gag was preventing him from talking.

“This is going to be unpleasant, Number Four,” His father said - his voice devoid of any hint of empathy or care. He was just an experiment, nothing else. He was a frog being cut open on the table. “But you already know that.”

The cramp came without warning, without mercy. His world turned into a universe of white-hot pain before he could even pretend to have wrapped his head around what was happening to him. A scream tore from his throat but the sound never escaped his mouth, trapped forever inside the cage of his body. Electricity shot through him and his body arched from the bed he was lying on, fighting against the leather straps that were keeping him down. His spine was going stiff, his toes curling up, and his fingers closing around the leather straps around his wrists.

“You need to try harder, Number Four!” Reginald barked and his mind was screaming at him. “Your brother would not be dead if you had tried harder!” The electricity stopped shooting through him and he slumped down on the bed like a broken raggedy Anne doll. There was no life left inside of him. He was sure of that. There was this face again looking down on him. Dr. Moncton - no, his father - shining a light into his eyes. He couldn't even flinch away from it. “Again.” The voice said and vanished from his field of vision.

He tried to mumble something, to ask his father to stop but then the pain shot through him again. Hours seemed to pass like this before his body slumped back on the bed harder than before. He felt like every bone inside of him had been shattered. There was the light again, shining into his eyes.

“You are my biggest disappointment, Number Four.” His father said coldly. He was back in the mausoleum again, cowering in the corner, his hair covered in dust and cobwebs. “If you’d only focus! But you’re too afraid! Afraid of what? The dark?”

He felt something running down his face. Hot and prickling at his over-sensitive skin. As he stared at the light, he saw himself lying in that bathtub, no older than fifteen. The water around him red from his own blood. A part of him wanted to go back and do it right this time. 

“Again” The voice of his father barked and: “Again! Again! Again!” At some point, he didn't feel the pain anymore.

※※※※※※※

Up was down and down was up. He had never felt this way before. Everything was warped. This was different from how it was when he first got to the sanatorium. He couldn't feel his skin. Maybe there was no skin left. Maybe they had skinned him while he had been out from the drugs they had given him. He couldn't feel his lips either and his mouth was dry. The room was spinning and spinning and spinning as he tried to make sense of it. 

The walls were covered in … cushions. Pillows. He was in a pillow fort. The pillow fort that he had built with Klaus and Ben when they were five in the attic before Reginald had tore it all down again. That was where he was right now. The pillow fort. He was five years old again and waiting in his pillow fort with Ben. He could hear him rustling with the book he had brought with him. Klaus would soon come and bring the cookies he had stolen from the kitchen after their mom had _‘left them out to cool down’_ and left the room for a minute to _‘take care of something’_. He could almost hear him come up the stairs to the attic, his naked feet smacking into the dusty old floorboards as he came into the room with the grace of a newborn giraffe.

He rolled onto his stomach but almost threw up as he did and slowly got to his knees. He couldn't move his arms. Maybe he didn't have arms. It took him a while to realize that he was in a straight jacket. Funny. There was nothing straight about anything in his life. Klaus would appreciate that joke, he was sure of that. Speaking of which - where was Klaus with the cookies? He was starving! Ben was already moaning in annoyance because of their brother’s lateness.

Somehow he managed to get to his feet and almost fell straight back on his ass again. He would’ve laughed about it, if he wouldn't be so fucking confused right now. The floor felt like he was walking on quicksand or a bouncy castle. He fell against one of the walls and now he was almost sure that he was inside a bouncy castle. He had never been to one. No, that wasn't right. He once snuck out with Klaus when they were fourteen and they went to a carnival. It had already been closed for the night but they had still snuck into the bouncy castle with a bottle of Tequila. It had been fun - until Klaus had started puking. 

Hopefully, he wouldn't start puking soon. 

**-End of Chapter 4-**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me what you think <3 <3 <3


	5. Chapter 5

There was no telling how much time he had actually spent inside the padded cells of Holbrooks Sanatorium. At least not by relying on his own mind. His mind seemed scattered. It could have been hours that he had spent drugged out of his mind inside that cell, days, maybe even weeks. The only thing he could say with definite certainty when he was finally released was that his back hurt like a bitch, he was hungry like a bear, and he was so dehydrated that he was sure he looked like a raisin. The moment the door was unlocked from the other side, Diego felt like he had no more strength left to get up from the ground on his own. Not that he had much of a choice in that regard anyway. Two nurses walked into the room to free him from the straightjacket. He thought that they would certainly lead him to get food after his ordeal but, instead, he ended up at Dr. Moncton's office not even ten minutes after his punishment had ended. 

Before he knew it, he was sitting on that leather couch again confused about how he had gotten here. Whatever drugs they had given him it sure was strong shit. 

“Diego” Dr. Moncton suddenly addressed him and startled him from his thoughts. He was leaning over his desk, propped up on his forearms, his notebook before him, his glasses down his nose, eyes that were boring into his soul. He looked at him like a hawk on the prowl. Diego hoped that Moncton wouldn’t make the error of mistaking him for a mouse. “How are you today?”

“Hungry,” He replied. His throat felt raw and scratchy, his voice was thick and hoarse as if he had screamed for days. Maybe he had. It wasn’t like Diego was the leading authority in regards to what he did or didn't do in this cell, after all. “Thirsty.” He felt off-balance and weird as if he had lost a part of him somewhere along the way. 

“We will remedy that soon” Dr. Moncton promised with a smile that was probably meant to look comforting. “But first I wanted to talk to you about what happened.”

“What _happened_?” Diego repeated in affront. “I was attacked and thrown in the padded cell for no reason.”

“Well, that is not exactly what happened, Diego,” Moncton replied - never losing his calm. He was different from Reggie in that regard. Reggie would have already lost his shit. Sir Hargreeves had never been a very patient man. 

“No?”

“No, Diego. You attacked a nurse as he tried to restrain another patient who was having a violent psychotic episode.” 

“No … No, I didn't attack that nurse, I … I wanted to help Klaus.”

“Klaus attacked another patient, Diego. Right after he left our session and he has yet to explain himself for this behavior.” Moncton’s look became more serious now, the slight smile slipping from his face at last. It was almost comforting to see. “But this is not why you are here, right? We are here because I want to talk about _you_ , Diego, not about Klaus or anyone else.”

“Well … I’m sorry then” Diego shrugged and pulled up his shoulders just a little to make himself look more remorseful than he actually was. Sometimes it was best to just play along. “I thought they were hurting Klaus and just wanted to help him. I can't stand seeing people getting hurt.”

“Ah, and there we have it again, don't we? Are you familiar with the term ‘hero-complex’?”

“Yes.” He groaned and rolled his eyes. So much for playing along. “It's for assholes who _think_ they’re heroes.”

“We spoke about your caring nature before,” Moncton said out of the blue. “And you expressed it in this situation with Klaus too. I’ve noticed that you already befriended him. Can you tell me why?”

“It's just…”

“When you attacked this nurse, you yelled, and I quote, _‘Leave my brother alone’._ ”

“Uhm…”

“I am going to present a theory to you, okay?”

“Sure, Doc.”

“You befriended Klaus because he reminded you of this little brother you talked about. The one who got addicted to drugs, the one you said you are always worried about. You’ve seen this confused young man and your affinity to help and protect, this mad obsession you have with playing the hero, immediately drew you towards our dear Klaus. He is the type to appeal to people like you but don't be fooled by that. He has a tendency to violent outbursts and rage whenever he suffers from one of his psychotic episodes.”

Diego was silent for a moment, afraid to give away too much. If he would say the wrong thing, there would be the possibility that he would get separated from his siblings again. And who would look out for Klaus then? Fuck. Yes, maybe he did have a bit of a problem. Maybe Moncton actually was onto something. 

“Maybe you’re right, doc” He then muttered and let his head hang in response. “It's just … my baby brother was always beaten the worst by dear old dad, you know? When I saw Klaus on the ground, I snapped. It looked just like it did when Dad would hit my brother. Back then I couldn't do anything about it but now … Now I’m stronger than most people I know.”

“I understand,” Moncton said patiently and scribbled something into his notebook. “Since this was your first offense, I decided to be lenient.” Diego swallowed his surprise at that. Lenient? He had been lenient as he had ordered Diego to be drugged and thrown in the padded cell for god knows how long? “But, Diego, if something like this happens again and if I get the feeling that your friendship with Klaus brings both of you more harm than good, I will have to transfer one of you to another ward.”

“I understand” He murmured. “Thank you, Doc. For being so patient with me.” 

“It's okay” He smiled. “I’m getting the feeling that in the past people haven't been very patient with you.”

“No” He scoffed, deciding to open up a bit more to Moncton to buy the man’s trust. “I stuttered as a child … it didn't get better when Dad lost his patience with me and started making fun of me or hitting me for it. So, I barely talked as a result.”

“I can imagine,” Moncton replied solemnly. “However, Diego, this is a place of healing and nurturing and we will get to the bottom of this. But now, I think, it's time that we take care of what your body needs. It's almost time for lunch.”

※※※※※※※

Klaus' fingers were trembling too badly to weave the blue and green threads together properly. He was trying but he couldn't focus and couldn't get his fingers to do his bidding the way he wanted them to. He was ready to throw it all to the ground or just start crying in frustration. In all honesty, he leaned more towards crying like a baby. He let out a frustrated whine as the threads still refused to do what he wanted. 

“Hey, it's fine” Luther muttered and patted his hand before he took away the half-finished and very messy bracelet. “Just take a break, okay?” 

“But I … I wanna make this for Diego” Klaus sighed and still gave the bracelet up to Luther as he realized that he sounded like a child. “He was in the padded cell for three days … because he wanted to help me.”

“I’m sure he’ll appreciate the effort.” Allison smiled in return. He appreciated it that his siblings wanted to cheer him up but at the same time, he felt stupid and small because of it. “He’ll be over the moon no matter what it looks like.”

“Because he has no taste” Klaus mumbled and leaned back in his chair. “That doesn’t mean I can let my brother run around with something hideous on his arm though … Someone has to look out for him or soon he wears a … bowling shirt or something.”

"I'm glad you are looking out for me, Bro" A voice suddenly called Klaus’ attention followed by a gentle pat on his back by a calloused, heavy hand. "I wouldn't know what to do without you, Baby."

"Diego! You're back!" He would have jumped up to hug his brother if it wouldn't have been for the nurses near the door, watching over the scene, and ready to strike. He had long come to the theory that only severely disturbed young men with an inferiority complex that liked to bully others into submission to feel better about themselves would take on a job like this in a time that allowed them to actually beat the patients that they had been assigned to look after. Most of them jumped at the opportunity to discipline a patient whenever they possibly could. Diego quickly retracted his hand too and sat down next to him after Allison had scooted over to make room for him next to Klaus. He smiled at her and she just gave a little nod of encouragement. 

“Are you okay?” Diego sighed as he sat down at the table and grabbed a few pre-cut threads of the green wool.

“We should ask you that,” Luther said in a low voice.

“I’m all good” Diego responded immediately brushing off the worries his siblings might have for him right now. “I just got to spend some quality alone time on loads of drugs in a nice quiet cell, that's all. What's more important is what happened to you, Klaus?”

He felt like he couldn't really say anything. He felt like he couldn't open his mouth to talk about what had happened that day, almost as if Dr. Moncton had put a spell on him. He didn't need to anyway. It was Luther who took over again and never had he been more grateful for his brother’s help. Luther had honestly come a long way since he came to this place. Maybe therapy was actually helping his brother. 

“Moncton took him to electroshock therapy after the incident” Luther growled. He remembered coming back from that experience and walking right into his siblings only for them to freak out completely about what had happened to him - rightfully so, maybe. “Afterwards, Klaus was in his room for almost two days to recover from this shit. I mean … electroshocks! Can you fucking believe that shit, Diego?”

He didn't like it when his siblings would talk about him as if he wasn’t there but right now it was welcome. As long as it meant that he wouldn't need to talk about the electroshock therapy and what it did to him, he was happy to have Luther explain it to Diego instead. The memories were still too fresh in his mind. It was all still too loud and jarring - a jumbled mess in his mind. He could barely close his eyes and try to sleep without seeing those warped images in front of him that Moncton had conjured up with the drugs and the shocks - without knowing what it was doing to Klaus in the first place. 

“ _What?_ ” Of course Diego reacted with anger towards the news and he had expected nothing less of the former vigilante. His brother had always been fiercely protective of him. Even as children. Klaus and Diego against the rest of the world. Right now, however, Klaus was afraid that this protective streak of Diego’s would only serve to get him in trouble again.

“It's no big deal,” He said quietly and sneaked a glance at the other man. He didn't dare touch him. Not with the nurses watching and waiting for him to make the tiniest mistake. It was hard, though. Klaus had always been tactile and so was Diego. They often didn't really need words - a pat on the back, a hand on his cheek would be enough to ground him and tell him more about what was happening in Diego’s head than any words could ever do. “Really, Dee … I’m okay.” 

“Okay? Are you kidding me?” Diego quickly lowered his voice again as he noticed the looks they got from the nurses around. “They gave you _electroshocks_ , Klaus! That's no laughing matter! This is fucking torture! Not even Dad-”

“It wasn’t the first time” Klaus shrugged, trying to play it off nonchalantly as if being shocked was not at all a big deal to him. He did it to shut his brother off before Diego could say anything else so that his hot-headed brother would not get even more agitated than he already was. At the same time, however, there were so many things he wanted to tell his siblings. About their dad, about why he was here, about his treatment, about being thrown to the wolves in jail for a couple of days but he couldn't. 

Every time he tried to open his mouth and talk about it, nothing came out. He wished Ben would be here but he couldn't even see his dead brother because of the heavy drugs they always gave him. He was sure that Ben was around, that he was watching everything but what good was it for if Klaus couldn't even talk to him? “And it won’t be the last.” He added even quieter than before. Hell, he missed his old self. He missed the loud-mouthed, eccentric, outrageous Klaus who would jump on this table and make a big show of his misery, who would have been able to rally people around him and bullshit his way out of any given situation. After what happened three years ago, this part of him seemed buried under six feet of dirt and he just couldn't find a shovel it seemed. All he could feel was a pang of deep-seated guilt that was riddling him useless.

“We have to get out,” Diego said in response to his words. Bless his heart, he still thought Klaus would be okay again as soon as they would manage to get out.

“But until then, we have to keep playing our roles as the picture-perfect, submissive patients” Allison frowned, directing her gaze at one brother at a time to hammer home her point. “You too, Diego. You being thrown into the padded cell and drugged was a huge blow to us regaining our powers and getting out of here.”

“What do you propose I should’ve done differently? Should I have not tried to help my brother?” Diego growled right away. Of course, Allison was right but even though Diego had been thrown back significantly in his detox, at least Allison and Luther had still had time to slowly wean off their meds. Their powers still seemed wonky, though, as far as Klaus was able to tell. At least they didn't have corpses trail after them as soon as they got off their drugs. 

“As hard as it is, yes” Allison sighed and raised a hand placatingly even though they all knew that this would do nothing to actually soothe Diego’s mind. “Because in here nobody can know that we are family.”

“Don't worry, Moncton believed the story I made up about the situation.”

“So don't do anything else that is suspicious.” Diego was gnawing his teeth at that, so Klaus gently patted his arm.

“Don't worry” He murmured so low that only his siblings could hear. “It's okay. I can do this. I was here for three years, after all. I can manage a little longer. I’ve had worse.”

He could tell that Diego was not happy about this but his brother gave a little grunt and then started braiding his own bracelet. “Okay show me how to do this then.”

※※※※※※※

He hated leaving Klaus out of his sight. He hated not knowing if he was being treated well by his doctors. After their little arts and crafts session, Klaus had been called into another session with Dr. Moncton again and Diego had been subjected to his first group therapy session himself. To his surprise, he saw Lila there too. She was the last person he wanted to see thereafter what happened with Klaus. And yet, he still didn't know just why Klaus had attacked her in the first place. 

Somehow he managed to get through the session without actually having to say anything because a woman - Karen, who always had rollers in her hair for some reason - kept rambling and rambling about a pet hamster she used to have in her childhood. When the session was over he wanted to leave right away but it was Lila keeping him there instead of when she just threw a couple of words at him in her thick British accent. “So Klaus is your brother, huh?”

“No he isn’t” Diego immediately replied as quick as a shot. So she had heard what he had yelled during the incident. Maybe, however, that was his chance to get a bit of information out of this woman. Maybe she could tell him what happened. He didn't think that he would get very far with Klaus in that regard for some reason. “That was just my ‘psychosis’ speaking but I’m still sorry that he attacked you. Have you any idea why he did that?” 

“I don't know, I offered him water because he looked like he needed it. We talked for a bit and then he just attacked me completely out of the blue.” She replied and shrugged her narrow shoulders, her wide eyes never leaving Diego’s face. 

Lila was staring so intently that he thought that she was actually trying to read his mind. The way she looked at him truly was unsettling. Of course, she was attractive and maybe, under different, more normal circumstances, she would be the type of woman he would go for. She seemed strong of mind, passionate, confident. All attributes he liked in a woman. Patch had been like this too. But these were no normal circumstances. He was not supposed to be here; not in this time and not in this place. And Lila, for all intents and purposes, was crazy. It would be wrong to even entertain a fantasy like this. Not to mention that he had just lost the woman he loved. For him, it had only been a couple of days since Patch had died. He couldn't quite get rid of the feeling, however, that Lila was perhaps preying on his instincts and he didn't like that feeling. 

“He’s a crazy bird, that one. I would stay away from him if I were you. You know why he’s here?”

“Not really.” He lied. Then again, it wasn’t that much of a lie. 

“He’s here because he’s playing for the other team, you see? Well, that and because he harassed that young boy at that restaurant, telling him he loved him and shit. Apparently, he thinks he was a soldier in Vietnam and a time traveler and shit. And he hears voices. So, yeah, crazy bird!” She cackled. “I mean don't get me wrong I like crazy but he’s a bit much even for my standards! You should hang with me instead. I’m a delight to be around! I can even get you extra bacon. I have my ways.”

“I’m good, thank you” Diego shrugged. “I don't care much for gossip - or bacon.” But he cared for Klaus’ side of this story and tonight, he decided, he would get it. He brushed her off as Lila tried to say something else and quickly left the room even though it might look like he was trying to escape. Maybe, in a way, he was.

During dinner, a little later after Diego's first dance therapy class with Allison - who still made fun of him in the queue to pick up their food - Klaus looked pale and a little green in the face. He was already sitting at a table with Luther and was currently just picking listlessly at his food. That in and of itself wouldn't be too unusual, of course, but Diego could see right away that Klaus was not going to eat anything tonight. If anything, he looked like he wanted to curl up under the table and hide forever. 

“He had aversion therapy today” Allison informed him quietly as she too took notice of their brother on their way over to the table. Klaus looked like a ghost the way he sat there, pale and unmoving except for the scraping of his fork across the plate in front of him. 

“What do you mean?”

“That's where … they expose you to a stimulus while simultaneously subjecting you to some form of discomfort. That could be electroshocks or a drug that makes you throw up, for example. That's so that you are conditioned to associate the stimulus with unpleasant sensations instead. They think that this way they can … well, _cure the queer_.”

He felt his blood run cold at that. Sure, he had heard about that before but to know that his own brother was a victim of this form of therapy and was subjected to it by uncaring doctors that didn't understand that homosexuality was not some form of mental illness, made him sick to the stomach. He wanted to find whoever did this to Klaus and beat the shit out of them.

“No wonder he looks like he’s going to throw up.”

“He probably already did” Allison sighed with a sympathetic wince. Together they walked over to the table and sat down with Luther and Klaus. A part of him wanted to pat Klaus on the back but he felt that this would probably be the wrong move after what his brother had been through today. He would probably flinch away from Diego anyway. 

“I kicked Diego’s ass during dance therapy today,” Allison said to the group as a way of lighting up the mood and distracting Klaus. Diego was amazed by how quickly they fell back into old patterns. The three of them had not often worked well together as a team outside of missions. Only when it had come to the rare occasions when they had needed to help one of their ‘younger’ siblings, they had often banded together. It was an open secret that One, Two, and Three saw themselves as the older siblings, the ones who were responsible for the others. 

“You didn't kick my ass” Diego huffed quickly. “I was way better than you. I have the hot Latino blood coursing through my veins, after all. Dancing is in my blood, sis.”

“It sure is” Allison laughed. “But seeing you dance with that ribbon thingy was just too good. I wished I had a camera! It was almost as amazing as seeing you do ballet when we were kids.”

“Klaus was the only one of us who was actually any good at ballet” Luther shrugged. “I remember Five almost breaking his foot once and how Ben started crying during one of the lessons. But Klaus rocked it.”

“I should have become a ballerina” Klaus mumbled into his beard. Christ, his brother needed a shave and a haircut desperately. He looked more like a homeless person than he had ever looked while being homeless. “At least then I would have taken all the stops, right?”

“Hey … no” Allison cooed and brushed a hand over his arm as Luther’s attempt of cheering Klaus up seemed to have backfired dramatically. “Don't let them get to you, Klausie. You are perfect the way you are. You need to pull through just a bit longer. We’ll get out of here soon, I promise.” 

He couldn't tell how much that actually helped his brother so he nudged Klaus’ shoulder. “Let me tell you one thing, Bro, only the manliest of men are able to pull off the moves you used to pull off. I mean, show me one big, macho, buff guy who can do a Développé!” 

Allison allowed a groan to slip out but Klaus humored him with a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. It was good to see that his stupid macho attitude still worked miracles on his baby bro. He could only hope that their powers would come back soon so that they could get out of this fucking nuthouse. 

For the first time since he came to this place, he was actually looking forward to going back to his room as the time for it came. At least now he would get a proper chance to talk to Klaus through their vents without anyone interfering.

First, however, he was subjected to his first full bath in this place after being locked in the padded cell for three days. It certainly was not the most comfortable situation he had ever been in. He had seen the room before on his first day but being in it was weird. There was a row of five tubs all lined up next to each other with barely 6 feet apart and a wooden chair next to each tub for a nurse to sit on and watch over their respective patient. 

As Diego sat in the very much lukewarm water with a nurse sitting beside him he felt like a toddler that couldn't be left to their own devices in the bathtub. He had never felt more uncomfortable in his fucking life - and considering what his life looked like so far, this was quite the feat. 

“Last time someone watched me bathe was when I was like nine years old and taking a bath with my little brother” He muttered to himself. “And that was only because I threatened to drown that little weasel for eating the last cookie before I even had one.” 

“Yeah” The nurse beside him, Paul, sighed. “Believe me I feel just as uncomfortable watching a grown man bathe. It's protocol though.”

“Afraid I kill myself?”

“Either that or accidentally drown … You wouldn't believe the shit that's happening in these tubs sometimes. People poop or pee themselves.”

“Okay, now I want to get out,” Diego shuddered. Paul seemed alright, though. As far as Diego could tell, he was one of the few nurses that were not always waiting for the perfect opportunity to use their baton.

“We cleaned them since last time.” Paul chuckled.

“And when was last time?”

“Four days ago or something.” Paul turned a page in the book he was reading. It was some kind of coursebook for mathematics. So, he was a student then. “So, you really believe Kennedy will be shot, huh?”

“I don't _believe_ it, I _know_ it.” He murmured just as the door opened again and interrupted their rather peaceful conversation. Another nurse was dragging Klaus in who looked very unhappy with what was going on here. 

He had to bite his tongue as he witnessed his brother getting manhandled into another bathtub after undressing right there in front of Diego and Paul. Privacy was not something they took seriously here and decency … well, they had given that up when they entered the sanatorium, as it seemed. Klaus looked horrible as Diego saw him in the loud neon light of the white-tiled room. There were marks all over his body - probably from being manhandled so fucking roughly all the time by the nurses. 

He wanted to say something about it as his brother landed in the water with a splash but he knew that this would only make it worse for Klaus. He had his eyes on the water of his own bath, trying to take steadying breaths to not freak out, jump out of the tub butt-naked, and beat the shit out of the nurse that was assigned to Klaus. He barely risked a glance over at his brother as he was sitting in the tub only a few feet away from him. 

Thankfully, Diego was soon released from his suffering and headed back to his room even though he would much rather stay close and have an eye on his baby brother instead. It would probably not be very good for both of them, though. Back in his room, he sat down on his bed and allowed the weight on his shoulders to push him into the mattress for just a moment. He lay there on his back, staring at the ceiling and taking stock of his surroundings and his own body - the way his feet were tilted, the way his spine connected to the mattress, the way his chin was tilted. It was a calming exercise that helped him to ground himself in the here and now. Funnily enough, it was an exercise that Klaus had taught him when they were teenagers and Klaus had discovered yoga for the first time to cope with his anxiety and the terror of his existence.

He took three steadying breaths before he started to look around the room. Everything was just like it was before he had been locked away. Then, however, something on his desk caught his eye. He quickly got up again and bridged the distance between his desk and the bed with one wide step. It was just a piece of paper with a crudely drawn smiley on it and, next to it, a friendship bracelet in blue and green yarn. With a huff of breath, he quickly put it on and tied it together just as he heard shuffling steps in the room next to him. He sat back down on his bed as he heard the creaking of the box springs in the other room and waited. Not even fifteen minutes later the doors closed and the lights went out. 

He waited another moment before he got up again, sat down on the ground next to the vent, and knocked against it to get Klaus’ attention. 

“Diego?” Not even ten seconds later Klaus’ voice came through the vent.

“Hey, Sugar” He replied only to hear Klaus huff a breathless little chuckle. They had always enjoyed using pet names for each other - the more ridiculous the better, no matter how that would throw other people off. He remembered one time calling Klaus ‘Baby’ over the phone with Eudora in ear-shot and it had taken all his skills in persuasion to convince her that he had been talking to his brother. “How are you, Bro? What did they do to you?”

“I’m sorry they put you in the padded cell because of me,” Klaus replied instead of answering his questions.

“It's not your fault.” Diego sighed. “And I’m good. Really. At least they didn't shock me. I mean electroshocks? How messed up are they?” There was silence and, not for the first time, Diego felt as if he was missing a piece of the puzzle. “You don't need to talk about it if you don't want to. But tell me why you are here, Bro. Please. I wanna be there for you but I can’t if I don't know the story.”

Again he was met with silence and was almost sure that Klaus wouldn't tell him anything. Just as he was about to say something else, his brother took a deep breath and he imagined him leaning his head against the wall - so he did the same. Immediately he felt more connected to the man on the other side of that wall. They were twelve again and sitting on different sides of the same door.

“I found Dave.” Klaus finally whispered. _Dave_. He remembered Klaus talking about it when they hijacked that icecream truck. He had told him about Vietnam and Dave and how he had died in Klaus’ arms. At first, Diego hadn't believed him but then, taking the events of that hellish day into consideration, he had decided that Klaus wouldn't lie about shit like this. Sure, his brother was a liar and a thief but what reason would he have had to conjure up this fantastical story about time travel and falling in love in the midst of the Vietnam war, knowing full well that nobody would ever believe such a story. Nobody except Diego. “He lives in Dallas.”

“Oh…”

“Yeah … First … I just wanted to see him, you know? Take a peek and then leave him alone. But I couldn't … just leave him alone. I always mess things up. That's what I do.” 

“That's not true.”

“Yeah … yeah, it is.” He hiccuped. “I talked to him - even as Ben said I shouldn't and … I just wanted him to understand that he must not enlist in the army. Instead … when his homophobic uncle heard me, he dragged him to the enlistment office and got him enlisted in the marines right away - as if he couldn't wait for his own nephew to die in a mindless war!” Klaus paused for a second and he could almost see him trying to collect his thoughts before he continued with a low chuckle. “I mean … all things, considered … I looked like a complete lunatic. The US will only really get involved in the war this year, right? After Kennedy’s assassination. For all Dave and his uncle Brian knew … I was one more crazed anti-war, anti-government, anti-capitalist, anti-military hippie.”

“Which you are.”

“Which I am.” Klaus sighed softly. Just to think that his brother had been fighting in that war always made his stomach turn. Maybe it was a bit much to claim that Klaus was actually anti all these things he had brought up, but his brother was certainly a lot more of a pacifistic character and not much in favor of any authority or socially-economical construct. “I … went to the bus when he was leaving town for basic training, tried to get him to just run off or something. That's when I was taken in by the police. Apparently, I was making a huge scene or throwing a hysteric fit or something - that’s what they called it, at least. Of course, the real reason why I ended up in that cell was that I’m a queer, right? They made sure to throw me in a cell with very big, very white, very straight guys so that they could beat the shit out of me.”

“I’m gonna kill them,” Diego spat.

“When they caught me talking to thin air, they had yet another reason to lock me up here.” He took another shuddering breath on the other side of that wall. “The worst part is that, for all I know, Dave could be already dead now. I have no idea where he is. If he’s already in Vietnam or if he’s still in the US.” 

He wished he could crawl through that vent and hug his brother. He sounded like he needed it. “I’m sorry, man” He whispered. “I truly am. Fuck … I wished I would have been there. I would have beaten those people's asses. We would have taken Davey, tied him up somewhere, and forced him to stay the fuck away from this stupid fucking war.”

Klaus fell silent again on the other side and Diego was almost certain that he had said or done something wrong that only made his brother even more upset. Then, however, Klaus spoke up again, so silently that Diego wasn’t sure he had heard him right at first.

“I love you. You know that, right?”

He breathed out a chuckle at those words, relieved to hear something like that from Klaus. They were not really raised to throw those three words around without intention - or at all. And they, Diego and Klaus, usually found other ways to say it without saying it. Hearing it so straight forward from his brother was nice for a change and Diego hadn't even realized how much he needed that until he heard it. “I love you too, Bro.”

**-End of Chapter 5-**


	6. Chapter 6

Three years and Klaus still had not gotten used to being in this place. Sometimes, he went through his days without knowing what was happening to him, whenever Dr. Moncton deemed it necessary to heighten his dosage to keep him ‘calm and relaxed’. Sometimes, he would sit in one place and when he would blink, hours would have gone by without him noticing it. He felt like a vegetable half the time. He would sit somewhere and watch the sun move across the sky until the shadows would grow longer and darker and suddenly it would be night and he would find himself in his bed without knowing how he got there. Moments like this should scare him. It was scary. But sometimes it was hard to get his mind to even care about stuff like this. Sometimes even the instinctive act of feeling emotions was too much - too exhausting. 

It had gotten a little better since Luther and Allison, miraculously, joined him here inside the sanatorium. Suddenly he had had two people who were watching out for him and trying to make sure that he was not being mistreated too badly. Of course, there were certain things that even his siblings were powerless against and wouldn't be able to help him with. However, even with them and now with Diego by his side, there were still days when he would be barely any better than a zombie sitting in his room and drawing like a madman through the night without even realizing what he was doing. 

Everything was better than the voices, though. No, not _voices_. He knew that it wasn't _just_ voices. He was the expert for these kinds of things, after all, right? Whenever they would give him a lower dosage of his meds, he would see them everywhere - the ghosts of the former patients. Like that one young woman who always appeared inside his room, a makeshift noose around her swan-like neck, her thin arms all scratched up, thin and gaunt looking. It was hard to say when she had died but a long-fucking time seemed appropriate for the estimate.

She, however, even with all her misery and despair and sadness, was one of the more pleasant spirits that were haunting this place. 

Maybe the worst part was that he still couldn't see Ben. Even when his meds would wear off enough that he could see the ghosts around him, Ben wouldn't show up to him. It was like Ben was drowned out in the sea of spirits around him. He was sure that Ben was here, that he was watching him. He could sense him nearby, but for some reason, he could still not see him. He missed Ben. Fuck, how many times had he cried out for Ben after he had first gotten admitted to this awful place? He remembered being in that padded cell for so many months, screaming and crying for Ben to help him.

He had been there in the first couple of days, pretty much holding his hand through the beginning, and then, one day, Klaus had woken up and had been alone. As he woke up on this day, he was, sadly, not alone. There were three ghosts crowding around his bed. He remembered talking to Diego through that vent last night. At some point, Diego had told him to go to bed because he needed his sleep, so he had done it. The moment he had been in his bed, there had been three knocks on the other side of the wall his bed was pushed against and he had answered it with three knocks of his own. It felt good knowing that he had his big brother on the other side of that wall watching out for him. It made him feel just a little more sane - grounding him in reality.

It made him feel like there was hope on the horizon. Now that Diego was here, they would surely get out of this place. Not that he didn't trust Allison or Luther to get shit done but … Well, Diego was generally better at that - and that was saying something considering how bad Diego usually tended to be when it came to getting shit done. 

The sad truth and even Klaus with his drug-riddled brain could see that, was that they needed Five. Five who might just be dead or otherwise would have found them already. He wondered where Vanya was too and why, if she was still alive and running around somewhere, the world had not gone up in flames yet. It had been dangerous enough to travel with a nuclear bomb like their sister, to begin with, but now that Vanya was possibly alone out there and not in control of her powers… Yeah, well, they were all probably going to find another fiery death soon. All things considered, he could really go without that. 

Three years. He thought about Dave. Poor naive Dave. Was he still alive out there? Was he already dead? A part of him thought that there was still a chance that he could be saved. Perhaps not by him though. The only thing he could cling to now was that Dave would maybe not end up on that same hill and not die a horrible death on that battlefield. Maybe there was still hope for him. Maybe just by Klaus being there and changing a small, little detail, he would live. Maybe he would come back from this war, find love and be happy. Even if it wouldn't be with Klaus it was everything that he wanted for Dave and more. Love meant putting someone else's happiness before your own, after all. 

The moment the doors were unlocked, Klaus was out and about like every morning. It was hard to beat this habit, even after his siblings had joined him in this facility. In the beginning, he had left his room and went to breakfast as quickly as possible to be able to choose where he wanted to sit more freely and thus avoid the other patients as much as possible. It was weird. He used to be very outgoing and extroverted. He used to make friends - or rather acquaintances - easily. He knew that he was charming. Ever since he became a patient inside the sanatorium, however, he tried to stay as far away from other people as humanly possible. Sometimes he couldn't quite tell if the people he was talking to were real or not. Sometimes, in the beginning, he would talk to other patients and then be asked by Moncton who he thought he had been talking to. Every time it would crush him to realize that he had spent valuable time talking to a ghost. So, he had started to build a wall around himself, to hide as much as possible - and it had served him well, so far. 

“Morning, Babydoll” A voice with a thick accent greeted him as he stepped into the hallway and he was immediately faced with Lila who stared at him out of unblinking bug-eyes. Her face and neck still showed reminders of the attack. He could almost make out where he had wrapped his fingers around her delicate throat. “Already up and running, Sweetheart?” He tried to shove past her. “Oh, don't be shy, come on. I know we’ve gotten off on a bad start but, hey I’m not holding grudges, you know?”

“Hey, Klaus” Luther. Thank God for Luther. “Everything okay?”

Lila immediately took a step back as she saw the big lug approach. Not a minute later, Diego too stepped out of his room. He cast a weary look at Lila that Klaus couldn't quite put his finger on. 

“We were just having a friendly chat,” Lila smiled. “Isn’t that right, Sunshine?”

“Last time you had a friendly chat with him, he attacked you” Diego snarked. “So I would say, you should maybe rethink your approach.” Before he knew it, Diego was grabbing him by the wrist and Luther put his whole body between Klaus and Lila as if she would be a dragon that wanted to devour him or something. Well, she was creepy, alright. 

“Oh wow aren’t you just an uptight little boyband.” Lila huffed and walked away with a lazy smile and a wink. 

“What's her deal?” Diego frowned as he followed her with his gaze.

“Don't fall in love with her” Klaus sighed. “That’s all I’m asking.”

“What?” His brother all but erupted. “Why would I? Hell no!”

“I’m just saying … your track record is abysmal - Patch being the exception. That woman was a god-damn hero.” A hero who shouldn't have lost her life in exchange for his. 

Diego snorted and smacked his shoulder but it had the desired effect of making Diego relax a little. After last time, he was just afraid that his brother would end up in the padded cell again just because he thought he needed to protect him. Not that he wouldn't appreciate it that his brother wanted to protect him. He knew, however, that his brothers’ protection would not help him much against the nurses and neither would Allison benefit from it too much. 

It was a sad truth that the nurses liked to lash out against him because he was a ‘homosexual’ and against Allison simply because she was black. He was sure Diego too would face his own fair share of this in time - if he hadn't already. Breakfast came and went too quickly for his liking because it left Klaus alone again for his therapy sessions for the day. 

“So, Klaus,” Moncton asked as he stared at him over his glasses. “How are you feeling today?”

“No desire to suck cocks today, Doc.” He joked lazily even though he really didn't feel like it. There was a flicker of movement in his periphery. He could almost see the man standing beside him. If he would focus on him, he would take shape more clearly, Klaus was sure of it. The thought excited him as much as it scared him.

“I’m glad to see that you haven’t lost your humor - the same cannot be said for your appetite, as it seems. The nurses told me that you were barely eating anything these days, Klaus. You do understand why this is worrying me, right?”

“Because having a patient starve themselves to death isn't a good look for your hospital?”

“Klaus, I am deeply concerned for your well-being - for the well-being of all my patients.” Moncton sighed. “We did this before, haven't we? Do you really wish that we go back there again?”

“No” He immediately snapped and allowed a flare of anger to slip out at the word before he quickly lowered his gaze again on his feet, his hands in his lap and his right leg bouncing. “No, Doc.” He added a little quieter. “I wanna be good.”

“Your father” Klaus felt himself cringe and his entire body turn cold as if he had been doused in ice-water. “What did he do to you when you were little?”

“We talked about that already, Doc.” Klaus shrugged. He tried to play it as nonchalant as possible but he knew that he wouldn't be very successful - not with the drugs in his system. He was back in Vietnam, standing at the edge of a field, knowing that there were mines strewn all across it and unable to see them in the mud. He stood beside Dave, sharing a nervous grin and a drag from a cigarette before their platoon started heading into the field quietly. He would never forget the smell of burnt flesh. He would never forget what it looked like when a body was blown to pieces. It was like a … fine pink mist sometimes when a body was completely destroyed by an explosion. But, most times, it was a loud thundering crash and then limbs flying everywhere. He would never forget the screaming of the men witnessing this horror - or the screams of those who hadn't been dead right away. 

There was this one kid in camp, Charlie, who barely made it through basic training a month before being sent to Saigon and joining their platoon. Shortly before Klaus left, Charlie had killed himself and before that, he had been a twitching, trembling, blankly-staring mess for days. _Shell-shock_ , they had called it back then - _now_ , in the 60s. _PTSD_ they called it in Klaus’ time. He too was suffering from it. He knew that. He didn't need a doctor to tell him that. He didn't need a fancy diagnosis. He had seen bodies being blown apart by grenades and landmines. He had been there, not knowing if the next step he would make on a grassy field would be his last. He had never known if he would put his foot down and hear the tell-tale click of a mine - or if Dave would be blown apart by one right beside him. 

Dr. Moncton stared at him with questioningly raised eyebrows. Fuck. He had done it again. He had spaced out again. He had lost time again. What was the question? He wanted to grab Dave’s dog tags to hold onto for comfort but they were gone. They had taken them from him the moment he had been admitted. He felt naked without them so he started scratching his arm instead. 

“I … Uhm”

“He beat you,” Moncton asked but it sounded a lot more like a statement, so Klaus nodded. It was easier this way if he didn't need to actually use his mouth. “He had others beat you.”

“Sometimes” Klaus whispered. “My oldest brother … he was like a loyal dog to him back then. He did everything dad said.” It wasn’t Luther’s fault. They had all been eager to please the old man and none more than Luther and Diego - with the distinction that Diego had seen, at one point, that getting praise from their father had little to no worth and didn't make him feel better about himself either.

“You were the youngest?” They had discussed this a million times already and still, Moncton didn't tire of these questions as if he was waiting for the day when Klaus would say something different than the previous couple of hundred times that he had already asked that same question. 

“So to say” He replied quietly.

“Klaus … did your father or one of your brothers ever…”

“No, Doc” He sighed with annoyance. Again the same question. “I was never molested by my family. I was never sexually abused by my father - or my brothers or anyone else in that house. There is nothing of that sort you can use to explain my penchant for sucking cock. I didn't choose my sexuality. One does not _choose_ it. But I guess it will take you guys in the white coats a couple more decades to figure that shit out.”

He noted something down and Klaus knew that he had said something wrong. He always said something wrong and that only ever served to make things worse for everyone involved.

“But you have been through sexual violence before, haven't you?” Moncton asked, his eyes zeroing in on him like those of a hawk on a mouse. He was at the edge of the minefield again, sharing a lazy grin with Dave, taking a drag from the cigarette before handing it back to the man he loved. “You talked about it when you were first admitted.”

“Did I?” He huffed. “Doc, I can barely remember what I did yesterday thanks to the drugs you pump me with.” As Moncton’s gaze didn't waver, Klaus gave in with a sigh. “Yeah, I mean … I lived on the streets for thirteen years, so … People take advantage of homeless people or junkies that are passed out in an alley. People who pay for people like me sometimes forget what the word ‘no’ means. It's … It is what it is.”

“And can you say what it is? Can you actually use the word?”

“Sure.” Klaus shrugged.

“Are you going to?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Why would I? It's in the past, Doc. It's over and done with. No reason to cry about it. Every time it happened, I picked myself up from the ground and continued my life because what else was there to do for me? It's not like I could’ve gone to seek help anywhere. It's not like anyone would have helped me.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Well,” In 2019 maybe people would have actually helped him. If he would have gone to the police, they would maybe have tried - but he would have been one of the too many hookers or junkies or homeless people who had been assaulted, so… “I would have been sent here even sooner” He then huffed in response. “For being morally corrupt like this or for being an addict. And if not that, then I would have been thrown into jail for being a sex worker because apparently it's wrong to sell my own body. In jail or prison things like that happen on a daily basis, so … It was more beneficial to stay quiet. It's not like it happened every day, right?”

“The injuries you had when you were first admitted-”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“I can read you the report of our medical team when you were transferred here.”

“I’d rather not hear it.” He felt sick. “I was there, Doc.” He wanted to throw up.

Moncton looked at him in a way that made Klaus believe for a moment that he would read it to him anyway. Then, however, Moncton closed his file instead, sighed, and took off his glasses. “You are a very troubled young man, Klaus.” He snorted. “And with every session we have together, I think I see more and more issues that you are trying to hide from the world. You make up stories about being a time-traveler, about being a Vietnam veteran, about being a medium and being able to commune with ghosts, to conceal the deeply traumatizing wounds that have been inflicted on you from a very young age on.”

“Wow, Doc…”

“Did you have anyone in your family you were close to? Or did they all just stand by and watch how you were treated?”

“Not all of them.” He shook his head. “I had two brothers I was really close with.”

“So, what would they say to you if they could see you right now?” That question almost made him laugh. He had to be careful. He was treading dangerous grounds now. Moncton could never know about his siblings. Ben, oh how he wished he could see Ben now. Ben would know what to say or do. 

“Well, one of them would give me the broest of bro-hugs.” He shrugged despite the confusion on Moncton’s face by his choice of words. “The other would say that it wasn’t really that much of a surprise to find me in the nuthouse. He was always a bit of a negative nancy.” He could hear faint laughter from somewhere. Weird. 

“What I mean is, wouldn't they be worried or afraid for your well-being?” Moncton tried a new approach. He was surprised that this poor man had not yet given up on Klaus after so much time trying to make Klaus open up to him and failing year after year.

“Sure they would” He muttered. “My big brother … he used to listen to the police radio all the time and come out when he heard something about an overdosed junkie that fit my description. He was always worried and afraid to find me dead in a ditch somewhere. If he knew everything … I think he would end up in jail because he would go on a rampage. There was this one time … I was dating that guy for a bit. Well, he was an asshole. Wanted to pimp me out. When my brother heard of it, he came and beat the crap out of that guy. He almost killed him.”

“But did this brother of yours never try to get you to quit the drugs?”

“Oh, numerous times, Doc.” In fact, Diego had tried more times than he could count. So often Diego had plugged him from the ground in some random alleyway and taken Klaus home with him to sleep on his makeshift bed in the boiler room of the gym. So often Diego had signed him up for rehab, paid for his stay, and been disappointed by Klaus every time. “He drove me to rehab, again and again, gave me a place to stay in-between sometimes.” He added with a sad little smile as he recalled all those times Diego had bent over backward just to help him. He had never quite stopped believing in Klaus and that, to Klaus was a miracle. It only showed how big of a heart his brother had, how gentle his soul was. “But I always ran away. Being high was better than dealing with the ghosts. Well, and now look where it got me, huh?”

Moncton gave him another one of those long-lingering looks that reminded Klaus entirely too much of his late father before he gave a sigh and wrote something down in his leather-bound notebook. He was a child again, standing in front of his father’s desk, naked like on the day he was born, being examined like a frog during biology class, his measurements carefully noted down, his weight, slotted in and compared to the last examination. Other fathers would mark the growth of their children with a marker on a wall, his father had journal after journal filled with pictures and numbers of his scientific experiments. His whole life was noted down in detail and commented on in a leather-clad notebook with his number on the front. Every scar, every mark on his skin scrutinized by an uncaring man with scientific accuracy. In this book, his father had written everything down, even the day his voice had broken or the exact day Klaus had hit puberty, the time he had started growing hair on his body and face, every change to his body and face.

Moncton closed his notebook and placed his pen on top. There was no number etched into the leather of his notebook. 

※※※※※※※

His meetings with Moncton always left him a little scattered and nervous. Today was no different. An hour after he had first entered the room, he walked out and felt ready to puke. Soon, he would be subjected to this aversion therapy again and he didn't know if he would make it through another one. Killing himself became a rather appealing thought all of a sudden if it meant he could reclaim a little dignity for himself. 

Of course, killing himself was not really an option. If he would be all alone with his family dead, maybe. But as things were right now, he would never do it. 

No, he thought as he walked away from the office. He could do this. He had survived three years in this place and seventeen years with Hargreeves before he escaped the academy. He was stronger than the people here. He could do this and come out on the other side stronger than ever - and possibly even more traumatized than before. But that just seemed to be the path he had to follow through life. He never seemed to be able to catch a break. First his dad, then his time on the streets, then dad’s death, Vietnam, Dave, and then the fucking apocalypse that brought him here. It seemed to never end for him. His entire life was one big fucking downward spiral - a maelstrom of hurt and terror. 

He walked down the narrow corridor that was leading back to the communal space that all patients were sharing together with that thought still clinging to him like a parasite. Taking in the minimalistic decor around him on the walls, Klaus barely registered the scene that he came across as he rounded the next corner. It felt almost as if someone was tugging at his arm to gain his attention before he saw what was actually going on.

“You better watch that mouth of yours” He stopped dead in his tracks as he saw the nurse cornering none other than his sister against a wall. “You know what happens to people like you when they keep running their fucking dirty mouths, right?

He acted before thinking - which was not exactly that much of a surprise. Acting without thinking was just something he was very prone to doing. Before he knew it, he was behind the nurse and pulled him back by his shoulder, anger flaring up inside of him as he grew aware of Allison’s shaken-up expression by the sudden and probably unprovoked attack from the man. Klaus was no stranger to situations like this. They always happened suddenly and without a warning. They were always senseless. People like this man, Jeff, just liked to establish dominance over those they deemed inferior. His sister and he were such people. 

“Leave her alone” He snarled, momentarily forgetting the predicament he was in himself. Interfering with situations like this was never a good idea and would mostly only lead to more pain for him. “She didn't do anything.”

“Oh look” Jeff snarled before he broke out into a grin. “How fitting. Are you here to help your little girlfriend? Oh, my bad, I forgot, you don’t swing that way, right? Maybe it would be better if you would skedaddle and take care of your own bullshit - or do you want to go back to your special therapy again, Psycho? I can have that arranged, you know, Fairy?”

“Klaus, it's okay,” Allison muttered quietly. “Really, I’m good.”

The fury inside of him was like a living breathing creature as he stood there, helpless in the face of Jeff and his racism and homophobia. He was no stranger to this. He had experienced his fair share of hate towards his person in his time as well but here … here he was helpless. Truly helpless. Here, there was no other person who would stand up for him. Here he had no allies. He couldn't even talk back and defend himself. He was shoved back by Jeff so hard that he lost his footing and stumbled backward, ultimately falling on his ass. Jeff laughed at his misfortune and all the times that Jeff had beaten him or dunked him underwater in the bath, came crashing back down on him. 

What happened next, Klaus couldn't even begin to describe. It was as if a wave came crashing out of him and Jeff was suddenly thrown backward. He crashed into the wall he had previously pressed Allison into and slid down, his body like that of a ragdoll, passed out from the shock. 

“What was that?” Allison gasped in horror and hurried to Klaus’ side to help him up immediately. 

“I don't know,” He muttered. He didn't trust his brain or his eyes. He didn't trust what he had seen or felt. “I don't know.”

“Surprise telekinesis” A faint voice whispered into his ear but as he looked around there was no one there except him and Allison - and Jeff, unconscious on the floor.

“We should go before someone sees this and thinks we attacked him.” Allison helped him to his feet and then quickly pulled him away from the unconscious nurse. She only let go of Klaus, as they had reached the community room. Neither Luther nor Diego was anywhere in sight so Allison quickly dragged him over to a table where the staff had set up a board game for the patients. Monopoly. Awesome. “Okay,” Allison said after a moment of contemplation as they sat down together at the table. “Seriously, Klaus, what was that?”

“I really don't know.” He said once more, his fingers still trembling. “I’ve never done that before.” He shook his head as if this way, he would be able to make sense of anything that had happened in the past ten minutes. “I was just fucking angry and … lashed out, I guess. Whatever that means. I wanted him to leave us alone.” He added and watched Allison make her first move on the board as if they were talking about the weather. They had to act normal. _Act normal._ There it was again, the minefield and Dave’s lazy smile as he took a drag from the cigarette before flipping it away. 

“Maybe you have more powers than we thought” Allison smiled with reassurance at him. He said this as if this thought wouldn't be terrifying for either one of them. More powers? He was already overwhelmed by the ones he had always had. 

“But I can’t access my powers when I’m on drugs.” Klaus quickly denied. “As soon as they start wearing off a bit, the ghosts are back, sure, but I can’t even see Benny anymore. So why … even if I had other powers … why would they manifest now?”

“Maybe they’ve become unstable through your therapy.” Allison shrugged while Klaus was still too shaken up to even think about making a move on the board. “Maybe your therapy unlocked something in your brain that you suppressed. I mean … we really don’t know what influences our powers and what doesn’t, right? And when you got angry, your powers just became even more unstable.”

“Are you okay?” He then asked quietly, eager to change the topic. He didn't want to talk about possible new powers. It terrified him to no end. He didn't want to talk about it. He couldn't even think about it. “The way he treated you … I mean…”

“I’ve had worse, Klausie.” Allison hummed. “Since we arrived in the 60s, I mean. Really, coming here put into perspective what I thought I knew about my life and about racism in general. I mean, sure, the fight isn’t over even in our time but we don't appreciate enough how far we’ve come since … Well, now. To be honest, I’m more worried about how they treat you.”

“Me?” He whispered. “Why? I’m good.”

“No, you are everything but good,” Allison replied gently. “I can see that, little Bro. I mean … electroshock therapy … aversion therapy, being shoved around by those assholes and doctors…”

“It's okay” He shrugged. “I … Have I ever told you about the way Dad experimented on me?”

She seemed taken aback by his words, gasping like a fish as she now stared at him. “No” She then said quietly. “No, never. I remember you coming back from those special training sessions, being all shaken up and weak.”

“He liked to shock me too,” He confessed. “He used electroshocks to test things out. I never really understood what he was trying to achieve with that. He would tie me to a bed as they do here, put electrodes all over my body and shock me on different voltages for hours on end - whenever he was not locking me up in that mausoleum. He never explained anything to me. He never said what he was doing to me or why.”

“Klaus, that's-” She didn't finish her sentence because she probably knew that what she was going to say was redundant. “I’m so sorry,” She said instead. “I’m so, so sorry … I didn't know. None of us knew. If I had known…”

“You wouldn't have been able to do anything,” Klaus replied quietly. A part of him was glad that he had finally dropped that bomb. “You were all just as afraid of him as I was, after all.”

“Things will change as soon as we get out of here.” She promised and though Klaus smiled at her, they both knew that it wasn't this simple. It was never this simple. 

**-End of Chapter 6-**


	7. Chapter 7

“Your friend has a mean right hook” Lila drawled. 

She still looked a little worse for the wear and although she might just be an innocent woman, Diego was glad to see that Klaus could hold his own if it came to it. She had three massive scratches across her right cheek and a split lip - not to mention the marks around her neck. When it first happened, Diego hadn't realized how much damage his baby brother had inflicted upon her. He felt just a smidgen of guilt that he wasn’t feeling sorry for her. He probably ought to feel sorry for her after what had happened. No matter who she was or why she was in here. His gut feeling, however, told him that he didn't need to. Maybe it was the drugs that he wasn’t able to cut out a hundred percent or the environment or the shit he had seen before he came to the ‘60s. Whatever it was, the fact that he couldn't feel sympathy for her concerned him. He was meant to be a hero, after all. 

“What did you say to him anyway that he lost his shit?” He replied as he tried to maneuver the thread through one of the wooden pearls. He was very close to throwing a table. There was no way something like this was meant to be therapeutic! Making pearl bracelets was bound to make people into even more of a psychopath! It didn't help his anger issues - if anything it made him even angrier!

“Wow, way to blame the victim.” Lila huffed as she threaded another pearl onto a thread.

“I don't know you very well but I doubt that you are a victim, you know?”

“Presumptuous much?” She actually allowed a high-pitched laugh so slip out as if he had made a joke. Of course, Klaus shouldn’t have attacked her but he was still in doubt about the fact that his brother had attacked her for no reason. 

“Just call it a hunch.” He scoffed. “Something is seriously fishy about you.”

“I don't even like fish. I’m not a cat, you know.” As she didn't get the response she wanted, she rolled her eyes. “I just talked to him and he freaked out. Are you his mum or something? You are a bit overprotective, as far as I’m concerned. Or are you his secret boyfriend? He’s a pervert, right? A pillow-biter! Are you too? I thought you were in here because you wanted to kill a guy? But that's just a front, right?”

He gritted his teeth at that. This girl was really grinding his gears and she was unwilling to leave him alone as it seemed. “Klaus would never just attack someone without a good reason.” He said for clarification even though he doubted that Lila cared much about clarification. “He’s a peaceful guy.”

“So you do know him better than you let on.” Lila grinned and propped her chin up on her hand. Forgotten was the bracelet she was trying to make. “Tell me the story. Where did you meet? Was it love at first sight? Did you bump into him in a supermarket? Summercamp? A gay bar?”

“You need to get your head out of the gutter.” Diego groaned just as his name was called from the open door. Time for group therapy. Yay. “And stay away from Klaus because next time, it’s me who’s gonna attack you.”

“You see me trembling in fear.”

※※※※※※※

He could hardly move his own two feet. He felt nauseous and weak as he was slowly shuffling down the hall, his right hand dragging across the wall because he was afraid he might fall otherwise. 

“You don't look good.” The boy in the hoodie said and he could hear the concern dripping right off his voice. “You should go lie down.” 

He wanted to reply but he was too afraid to do it. If he would speak to thin air, they would lock him up, pump him full with drugs and shock him again. He couldn't go through that again. Never again. Why couldn't the voices just leave him alone? Couldn't they see how hard a time he already had because of them? Then again, what did he expect? Those ghouls that were following him around wherever he went had lost all humanity after death. They were just angry and sad and confused. If they could, they would destroy, would rip him apart.

Maybe they could actually rip him apart if his powers would become even more unstable now - at least if Allison’s theory was right. What if soon he wouldn't be able to hold them back behind the veil anymore? He was like a nuclear bomb but unlike Vanya, he wouldn't destroy the moon but just conjure a million angry spirits that would cause havoc. And fuck, if Allison _was_ right and he had more powers … that terrified him even more than the ghosts. He couldn't even control the one power he had had from early childhood on - how was he going to control a new power he hadn't even known about so far?

He stumbled more than he was walking but at long last, he finally reached his room despite the fact that the world was completely out of control. The walls around him seemed to be pulsating like a heart - breathing around him and the voices were getting more and more insistent telling him to sit down while he just wanted to throw up his guts. He had thrown up so much already in this tiled room as they had forced him to watch these clips of naked men. It was beyond embarrassing, sitting in that room, watching things that Doctor Moncton thought might be arousing to a _pervert_ like him, being seen and treated like a complete abomination. He had never had much of a sense of shame but this made him feel ashamed. Ashamed of himself - maybe not in the way Moncton wanted him to feel shame, though. He felt ashamed of who he used to be. Ashamed of that whoring homeless junkie who always got himself in trouble for no other reason than chasing the next high. The person who was on a first-name basis with EMTs.

“Sit down,” A voice said again. “Klaus you will fall if you don't sit down.”

He just wanted this voice out of his head. His head hit the wall next to his door to his room before he knew what he was doing. He did it again without thinking about it. And again. The voices were still screeching at him - louder this time, telling him to stop. His stomach was still revolting and churning but the voices became quieter and more distorted the more he did it. 

He just wanted it all to stop. He could still see the dias that Moncton had shown him. And Dave. Beautiful, strong, gentle Dave. He still saw him in his apron. He still saw him lying in the trenches. He still heard Moncton whisper into his ear about all the men who had taken advantage of him in the past, asking how he possibly could still be aroused by men after all the terror he had experienced - inflicted on him by _men_. He ought to hate them - to be disgusted by their touch. He hit his head again. The voices became quieter. He hit his head again. He barely heard the screeching. He hit his head again. 

Something soft was stopping him. 

“What are you doing?” No yelling, no shouting, no loud, growling guttural voice. The voice was deep but soft and the hand gentle against his forehead. “You are hurting yourself”

“Luther?” He heard himself ask quietly but he wasn't quite sure that he was actually the person speaking. “Where am I?”

“You are in your room” Luther whispered as if he was afraid that someone would hear him. Dad, maybe? _No, Idiot_ , a voice inside his head barked, _you are in the nuthouse, remember?_ The nurses might hear them and then he would get shocked again. “Come … Come, you look green in the face. Sit down with me.” 

He was putty in Luther’s big hands. In fact, he had no concept of how he got from the wall to the bed and finally found himself sitting down beside his brother. One of Luther’s arms was around his shoulders and the weight was comforting. 

“Deep breaths.” Luther murmured. “Remember how we practiced that as kids? Calm, steady breaths.” 

He did as he was told and felt the chaos inside his head subside - the nausea remained though. Even the touch of another man, even of his own brother, suddenly seemed too much to bear. His skin crawled and he hated himself for allowing Moncton to get to him in this way. 

“I’m just so exhausted, Lu” Klaus then confessed with a sob escaping his throat. He had always been excellent at bottling up his feelings, at hiding away what was truly going on inside of him. But now he just didn't possess the strength to do so anymore. “I’m so tired … I don't know how much longer I can do this…”

“I know” Luther whispered quietly and rubbed his shoulder in an awkward attempt of comforting him. “I know but I promise you that we will get out of here soon, okay? Just a bit longer.”

Just a bit longer. Just a bit longer. He could do ‘just a bit longer’, right? Maybe not. He didn't know if he could. He needed to though. He needed to bite his tongue and be strong for his family. The last his siblings needed was him being weak and emotional. He could do this. He had always done it. He had always hidden away behind easy smiles and witty jokes. The thought made him let out another sob.

He was so fucking exhausted. How was he going to act like he wasn’t while he was falling apart at the seams? And then something happened that he couldn't explain. He started talking. His mouth started moving without his consent, his brain short-circuiting. While he watched himself spill what he had wanted to keep locked up, he was sure that this was what a complete mental breakdown looked like. That young man sitting beside that giant on the narrow bed looked and sounded completely hysterical. 

There he was, talking and talking and talking about his therapy, about the pictures he had been shown, about the drugs that caused him to be nauseous, about Dave and how he could barely think of him without feeling sick. Sick, not because of the therapy but because he had failed to save him and because he would find a senseless, horrible death in Vietnam.

“Maybe you did change his fate, though” Luther tried to cheer him up. “He was in the army when he met you and died. Now he is a marine. You changed his path without knowing it, right? Just by talking to him.”

“And scaring him.” He sobbed.

“Maybe” Luther shrugged. “But maybe that was enough. Maybe, when we return to our time, you’ll find him still alive, a grouchy old man with a bunch of dogs living a happy life. I wished there was something else I could tell you, Klaus. But … I know what this sadness can do to a person. I’m not a stranger to loneliness and despair. After you guys had all left … and after the accident, I was desperate. I was lonely. I didn't know what to do with my life. Then Dad sent me up there and then I was truly all alone in the world.”

“I never asked how you dealt with that,” Klaus mumbled.

“Not very well, I guess.” Luther shrugged and lifted his shirt just enough for Klaus to see a bunch of old scars all over his stomach. “As if being alone wasn't bad enough … being alone and looking like this was just … it was too much. I realized that I helped to push you all away and I hated what I had become. I realized that I would never get to have a normal life, a wife, or children and all because I couldn't see and understand what you guys have understood a long time ago. 

So, I lashed out at the only person I could - myself. I wrote so many letters to Dad … asking him for more potted plants to keep me company, asking for something else than soy paste to eat. He never answered and I thought that this was my just punishment for pushing you all away. Later, I thought that he was too busy to entertain my childish demands. After that, I didn't dare ask again. I thought I deserved the hand that I was dealt in life because I was a bad brother and a bad son. I couldn't protect Ben, I couldn't make Five stay, I didn't stop you from ruining your life. There is so much red in my ledger and I have no idea how to make up for it.” 

“None of us were particularly good at being a family” Klaus heard himself reply quietly. They had to be careful, a voice whispered to him. They had to be vigilant. No one could know that they were a family. Having his family here was the only thing keeping him alive right now. 

“We still have time to change that, don't we?”

He nodded quietly and stared at the wall opposite his bed for a moment, his eyes traveling across the nightmarish pictures that he had drawn in a fit of despair or rage. Ghoulish faces were staring back at him. He remembered being in the academy, standing on his bed, and scribbling all over his walls in sharpy and whatever else he could get his hands on. 

_What must I do to feel anything?_ A voice had said and Klaus had written it down. _Vacuum the void of space. Space dust all clean_. None of it had made any sense. _Beast creatures mythical and real all must be ground to dust to stay anew._ And Reginald had watched him on the security footage and never said anything, never asked about it, never demanded him to clean up the mess he made. _See no truth. Speak no truth. Hear no truth._

He remembered how desperate the spirits sometimes got. _How do I know who I am?_ And they had asked him to do other things too. Once he had set his desk alight and his mother had barely scolded him while he had laughed. He still didn't know why no one had asked him, why no one had at least pretended to care about him. At some point, he hadn't even been able to say what his own thoughts were and what the spirits were whispering into his ears at all times. He would have set the whole mansion aflame if they would have been convincing enough. 

_How do I know who I am? What must I do to feel anything?_

Those were not his thoughts. Not in the beginning, at least. Later the lines had blurred significantly. He remembered being a loving child, a soft child. _Too soft_. His father had done his damnedest to beat it out of him. Beat everything out of him until he was nothing more than a husk. 

“When I was in jail after the Dave incident” _No_ , a voice groaned deep inside his head. _Don't say it. You don't have to say it. No one cares. Nobody ever cared._ “I was … I stayed in that cell for a couple of days before I got here. They threw me in with the meanest assholes they could find, I guess. To teach the gay a lesson. And it … it wasn’t the first time … you know? I mean, I was in prison, right? Guys like me … but it was different in prison. It was different on the streets too.” He thought that he made no sense but Luther pulled him closer with one arm and Klaus couldn't bring himself to look at him. 

“When I was in that jail cell … the officers knew what would happen. They wanted it to happen. And it was … different. On the streets and in prison it was never like that … never motivated by pure hate, never a tool to inflict pain for pain’s sake. They wanted me to suffer because they hated me for who I was. They wanted to punish me for being me. And I felt like I did as a kid again when I didn't belong when I couldn't fit in. It was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced.”

Except for Dave’s death, maybe. 

Luther was silent as he sat beside him and for a moment Klaus wasn’t sure if he had said all these things out loud or if Luther was just so disgusted that he couldn't react in any way. He would deserve it, wouldn't he? 

“When we are out of here, I will go to that police station and kill them all” Luther then growled. A guttural, deep, terrifying sound. There really wasn't much of a question about his seriousness either right now. To Klaus, it was clear that his brother actually meant what he was saying. And he knew that Diego too would do exactly what Luther was promising if he would ever find out about it. He didn't know what to say or what to do. He didn't even dare move. He hadn't meant to tell Luther all of this crap. It just happened. It had slipped out without his consent. A voice had whispered into his ear and he had been defenseless against it. 

Suddenly, Luther pressed a kiss to his head. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.” He said. “You should have never gone through shit like this, to begin with.”

He allowed himself to believe what Luther said for just a moment, even though he knew better.

※※※※※※※

“Thank you, Alan, for bringing that to the group,” Moncton said in his dry voice after Alan had finally ended his riveting tale of his life as a tax collector. “I think fear is something we can all relate to.”

Group therapy was exactly like Luther had told him it would be. He was sitting in a circle of other lunatics and just hoped that Moncton wouldn't call him to talk. Last time he had gotten off scot-free but today, Diego felt like Moncton’s attention was exclusively on him. He was the new guy in the group, after all. He felt like a child in class again. With the only exception being that Moncton wasn't Reggie and wouldn't ask questions about mathematical equations or philosophy that Diego wouldn't be able to answer to his father’s satisfaction. And Moncton wouldn't punish him for a wrong answer either because there were no wrong answers here in this circle. He was insistent on repeating that over and over. That everything Diego might have to say would be accepted and heard in this group and that no one would judge him here. In a way, it was tempting.

Right now, however, Diego sat there, clasping his hands in his lap, staring ahead but avoiding Moncton’s gaze as best as he could. Lila was there too, munching on something and staring at Diego as if he was a fly and she was a cat ready to pounce.

“Okay, who else would like to share?” Moncton asked and Diego knew what was coming. “Anyone? Come on, who’s next?” He could feel Moncton’s attention laser focusing on him. “Diego, you’ve been awfully quiet this morning.”

“Just taking it all in, Doc. Letting all the healing shit wash over me.” Moncton chuckled and Diego reminded himself that he had decided to play along and be good at the beginning of all this mess. He couldn't quite bite back on the snark, though - not after he had seen how bad Klaus was doing - not after he had heard what was being done to him.

“We talked about your father, the other day,” He noticed how Lila’s eyes were lighting up and flickering over to him again. “And your siblings. You said how your whole childhood felt like some kind of experiment.” 

Yes, he didn't imagine it. Lila absolutely looked at him differently now - more interested, alarmed maybe. As if she had been waiting for something like this. Maybe it was his paranoia taking over but what if she actually knew who he was? If everything Five had said about the commission, about Hazel and Cha-Cha was true, they would know that the Hargreeves siblings had traveled through time to stop the apocalypse in 2019 from happening, right? And if Diego would again try to stop JFK from being killed, they would send someone after him to prevent that. _What needs to happen, happens._ That was what Five told them after they had found him drunk in the library. At first, he hadn't given too much credit to his words but then, after everything that happened ... One couldn't be too careful and Lila just didn't really fit in here. Then again if she really was just a random nutjob … maybe she fit in here perfectly after all.

Either way, he didn't have time for shit like this.

“It _was_ an experiment.” He replied as calmly as he had before, despite the other patients staring at him in curiosity. Then again, he was crazy, right? They were all crazy.

“Hmm.” Moncton hummed. “Or did it just _feel_ like an experiment?” The same questions again and again. He was getting tired of it. How did Klaus survive this shit for three years without screaming his lungs out in frustration?

“No, it was literally an experiment.” Moncton scribbled something down like he usually would during their one-on-one sessions. It irked him.

“Let's dig deeper. You say your father is a villain, that he mistreated and abused you and your siblings, going so far as to push your youngest brother into drug addiction and a life on the streets. Something for which you seem to blame yourself as well. Just like you seem to blame yourself for the death of another one of your siblings.”

“Hell, yeah.” He muttered. There was no reason to lie about it. His siblings were not in the room with him right now. He wasn’t subjected to them sending him worried glances or sympathetic smiles or to Klaus looking guilty for making Diego feel like he was responsible for his issues as well. 

There was no way to sugarcoat it either. Diego may not be older than Klaus like he told Moncton, but he was still Klaus’ big brother and he had failed him like he had failed Ben and Vanya as well. Even Allison. He should have been by her side during her divorce and scared the crap out of Patrick for trying to take Claire away from Allison. And he should have been there for Luther when he went on that mission that changed his life forever.

“So you had to play hero to make Daddy mad.” It was the first time Moncton said something like this and Diego felt fury rise inside of him especially as Lila started laughing and the other patients looked at him with raised brows. “But what you have to realize, Diego is that you are not responsible for everyone around you. You don't need to play the hero for your siblings or strangers on the streets. What happened to your brother was tragic but not your fault and neither is the drug addiction of your other brother your fault or responsibility to fix.”

“I’m a grown-ass man, Dr. Moncton-”

“Who still defines himself in opposition to his father. His dead father.” It took all his willpower to swallow down his anger and not strangle this man to death. The same man who was torturing his little brother. And once more Diego could do nothing but sit back and allow it to happen. A fine hero he was. “That isn't really defining yourself, is it, Diego?”

“Yeah, why don't you tell that to Luke Skywalker?” Again, he was met with confused looks from the others. He knew that he sounded like a complete lunatic. “I know you don't get it, but that is an excellent reference.” Ben would be proud of him - the old nerd. He just hoped that Ben was still around watching over Klaus even though Klaus wasn’t able to see him. 

“Humor is good, truth is better,” Moncton replied patiently. “Who is the real Diego?”

And wasn't that a good question? Individuality was nothing that had been encouraged by his father. They were soldiers, not people. He was a number. Not even worth a name. “I don't know. I guess I’ve never known.” He confessed. It wasn’t even really a lie, was it? “But I’m ready. I’m ready to find out.” Klaus and Allison weren't the only actors in this family. In his opinion, he did a good job to convince Moncton of his willingness to play along, as he squeezed out a tear and the other patients applauded his bravery. 

“Thank you, Diego,” Moncton said and closed his notebook. Apparently, at least _he_ had bought this shit. “Okay, quiet time until lunch.”

“You’re so full of shit.” Lila turned towards him after Moncton was out of earshot. “And that story about a drug-addicted brother - bravo. I bet you are an only child.”

He wanted to say something without knowing what he wanted to say. What was there to say anyway? “You don't know anything about me.” He opted for, in the end, even though he knew that it was weak.

“You are an open book written for very dumb children.” 

“Hargreeves!” A nurse suddenly called for him. “You have a visitor.” 

Confusion hit him like a ton of bricks. A visitor? Who would visit him here? His siblings were here already. Vanya, he thought briefly. Maybe Vanya had finally arrived and found them here. It had been in the newspapers after all when he had been arrested. She had probably seen the article and come here to see him.

He jumped off his chair right away without sparing Lila another glance. He was swiftly led down the hallway and into another narrow corridor behind a securely locked door. On the day of his arrival here, he had been so severely drugged out of his mind that now he couldn't even remember if this was the same way he had come in originally. 

A few minutes after he had first been told of his mysterious visitor, he was led into the visitation room where another nurse was already waiting to supervise the meeting. He was considered dangerous, after all. What he saw as he entered the room almost made his jaw drop.

“Five” He all but breathed out.

“Hey, Diego.”

**-End of Chapter 7-**


	8. Chapter 8

“You look good in white.”

“About time you showed up.” He said sitting down on the uncomfortable plastic chair across his brother on the other side of the metal table in the center of the room. Remarkably, Five looked the same as he remembered him - as if it had been only yesterday. Well, for Five that was probably the case. Then again, unlike his siblings, for Diego, it had been two weeks since he had last seen that old geezer as well. Not much time had passed and yet an entire lifetime of events seemed to have washed over all of them.

“How’d you know I’d be back?”

“Because that's the kind of shit you pull.” He wouldn't tell Five that he had been worried that Five might have died during this stunt he had taken with his siblings. It would only serve to boost his ego and Five with an even bigger ego would mean doom for the rest of society. “How long have you been here?”

“Landed two days ago, in the alley behind Commerce-”

“And Knox?” Five nodded. So chances were good that they had all been spit out in the same place by that portal - just not at the same time because his brother Five couldn't be trusted to time travel anyone anywhere. He was like a very bad taxi driver. Honestly, it was a miracle that they had arrived in the 60s in their adult bodies and not either as old people or infants. The thought that they could’ve ended up in this time in their teenage bodies was a complete nightmare. 

“So how long have _you_ been here?”

“Fifteen days.” Diego shrugged.

“Where are the others?” He paused and risked a glance over his shoulder to the nurse that was standing behind him in the corner of the room and could hear everything. He lowered his voice, hoping that it was enough that only Five could hear him and that the camera above the door wouldn't pick it up either. He was not nearly naive enough to believe that Moncton wouldn't want to have a look at Diego’s visitor or the conversation he was having. 

Surely, he would ask him about it and Diego would need to find an explanation that made sense. He couldn't tell him that Five was his brother because he had told Moncton that his youngest brother was a drug addict living on the streets. His cousin, perhaps. Yeah, that might work. Especially if Five had used his real name as he had written down his name in the visitor registration form that they were so keen on using in this place.

“One, Three, and Four are here.” He opted to say, staring at Five and hoping that the little asshole would understand why Diego was not using their names. Five’s expression changed right away and the usual scowl that always seemed edged into his pubescent features gave way to relief. “Seven?” Diego asked finally. The thought of Vanya, a literal nuclear bomb, roaming around confused and scared in Dallas in the 1960s without anyone to explain shit to her, was still terrifying. 

“Found her on a farm a few hours after I got here. There was an ad in the newspaper with a photo of her. Apparently, she was struck by a car when she arrived a few weeks ago. She lost parts of her memory and the woman who hit her took her in to care for her on her farm.” Five shrugged. “Which is pretty decent, I guess. She’s safe now. I could convince her to stay in the city until I have found you guys. How long have the others been here?”

“Four arrived three years ago, then Three came along two years ago, and One shortly after a few months ago. All of them ended up in this hell hole shortly after they were spat out. Nice move, by the way.”

“I told you it was risky and you were all fine with it.”

“Yeah, what choice did we really have?” Diego groaned. “At least I don't have to go through puberty again. I guess that's a plus. How’d you find me?”

Five scoffed and pulled a folded up piece of paper out of the breast pocket of his blazer. Immediately Diego rolled his eyes and leaned back in his chair. “Page 16.” Five sighed. “Disturbed man with multiple knives arrested outside 1026 N. Beckley. That's Lee Harvey Oswald’s house. Care to explain?” Really, Five sounded more like a disappointed dad than their actual dad ever had. Maybe it was because Five actually cared about him - unlike his father.

“Let’s just say, Dallas Law Enforcement has not been supportive of my attempt to stop the assassination of John F. Kennedy.” He drawled in a way of responding to his older younger brother. 

“That's because it hasn't happened yet.”

“And it's not _going_ to happen.” He said softly as he and Five both leaned closer. “Not on my watch. Look … we have a plan, alright? Another day or two and we’ll be out of this place, then I’m gonna stop Oswald and save the president. You want in, say the word.”

“Listen to me very closely, you gibbering moron. You are not going to do a damn thing.”

“Why not?”

“First of all, because we have to stop the apocalypse.”

“No shit. But that doesn't happen for another 60 years.”

“Not _that_ apocalypse. This is a new one.” Because of course it fucking was. “It followed us. I've seen it. Nuclear war, Diego, in ten days.”

He couldn't help but laugh at that. “And I’m the one they locked up, huh? If I wouldn't know it any better I would say you should be in here with us. Fine, I’ll play along. What causes it?”

“I don't know.” Five snarked. “Maybe some looney-tuned asshole with a hero complex tried to save the president and screwed everything up.”

“So you’re saying it worked? I saved the president?” He growled softly, trying to suppress the desire to jump up in joy as to not get tackled again by the nurses. “I knew I could do it.” And if he could save the president there was nothing he wouldn't be able to achieve. He could help Klaus and Vanya and the others. He could prove dad wrong. He could prove himself wrong. Maybe even Eudora’s death wouldn't have been in vain. She would be proud if she would know that Diego managed to save the president, right? “Okay, I’ll help you.”

“Thank God.” Five said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. 

“After I saved Kennedy and then you swing us back a few decades and I can slit Hitler’s throat off with a butter knife.”

“And this is why you don't have any friends.” Five remarked completely unimpressed and uninterested in his proposal. Then, however, he rolled his eyes again. “Even if I would indulge you in your little fantasy, Diego, there is still this pesky little thing called the Commission. Remember them? Even if you would kill Lee Harvey Oswald, they would just send one of their agents to do the job instead. And do you want to know how I know that? Because I was that guy who was assigned the job in case Oswald got cold feet - or rather, I will be assigned this job. Actually, I should arrive in a couple of days to prepare for it. JFK will die one way or another, Diego. It has to happen. And if it, for some weird reason, doesn't happen, JFK will declare war against the Soviets and that war will escalate in a nuclear blow out in just a couple of days. I understand your desire to do something good. Anyone who has the power would want to go back to stop Hitler or save Kennedy or tell Prince Franz Ferdinand not to leave the hotel in Sarajevo. But that’s not how it works, Diego. 

The fact that we are here is dangerous as it is for the timeline. We interact with other people and those people interact with other people and just the fact that they interacted with us when they shouldn’t have been able to because we shouldn’t be here, has repercussions. Never heard of the fucking butterfly effect? Everything we do has to be carefully examined and thought about. Everything we do here can have major consequences down the line - even leading to the outcome that we might never get adopted by Reggie and never become a family. Despite what you like to show to the world, Diego, I believe you are smart enough to understand it. It's easy to look at you and mistake you for a caveman but we all went through the same education. You are fluent in seven languages even though you slept during most of Spanish and French and you have learned higher mathematics. You had the privilege of the best tutors that can be bought with money - So, I would advise you to use at least two of your three brain cells if that’s not too much to ask.”

Diego was silent as he allowed Five’s words to sink in. Apparently, he was silent for too long because Five, who had the patience of a hyperactive squirrel in a cage on a good day, already made a move to get up when he hadn't answered him for more than two seconds.

“Okay” He finally gave up. It was odd to hear Five talking to him like that, even acknowledge the fact that Diego wasn’t as stupid as people liked to make him out to be. Maybe he had all too willingly played into that stereotype as well, just like Luther and Klaus. Well, in their defenses, their confidence in themselves was not really all that strong. Reginald had done his best to make sure that they would always feel small and insignificant, after all. “Okay, I get it. You’re right. Do you have a plan?”

“Sure”

“Liar.”

“Don't worry about it.” Five scoffed. “I will have a plan when I am ready. I have made … preparations. Pulled a few strings, organized a base of operations that’s safe. Just be … ready, I guess. It might take one or maybe two more days before I can get you all out.”

Diego nodded and again, Five made a move to get up. This time, Diego reached out and grabbed him by the wrist. “Just … hurry, okay? Four is here for three years now, Five. He’s … He’s not doing well and I don't know how much longer he will be able to keep going before they break him.”

“He’s strong.” Five replied calmly and seemingly without emotion. He noticed how Five was avoiding his eyes as he said it before he finally looked at him again. Diego knew better than to think that his brother was without emotion, though. Five had spent over forty years in the wasteland of the apocalypse and after that, he had done everything in his power to return to them to save them from certain death in the apocalypse. Five might put up that cold and uncaring facade all he wanted but they all knew that Five loved them or otherwise he wouldn't have risked so much to be reunited with them. “He’s stronger than most people I know, honestly. Just keep a close eye on him.”

“If you can’t get us all out at once, take him first, okay?”

“Promise.”

“Pinky promise?”

Five rolled his eyes and shook his head but then added with a sigh and a smirk: “The pinkiest.” 

“Five?” He called out before his brother could finally leave the room. “How big is the chance that some agent of the Commission could be here watching … me?”

Five paused in his steps at that and for a moment he didn't say anything just stared at him instead - seemingly lost in deep contemplation. Diego almost expected his brother to say something along the lines of _‘Why would the Commission be watching you of all people?’_ but Five surprised him.

“One can never be too vigilant.”

※※※※※※※

“You really think Lila could have been sent by the Commission?” Klaus asked quietly through the vent between their rooms. He sounded terribly tired. He hadn't joined them for lunch or dinner. It had been up to Luther to tell him and Allison that Klaus wasn’t feeling well after his last therapy session with Moncton. Apparently, he had even thrown up into the trashcan by his desk earlier. 

“At least Five couldn't outright eliminate the possibility.” He sighed. “But I don't know. I mean … tell me about her, what do you know?”

“Oh, _now_ you want me to be your Robin.” At least Klaus could joke around again. It was weak but it was a start. “What do I gain from helping you, Batman?”

“I buy you waffles at Griddy’s as soon as we are back in our time.” He replied, deciding to join Klaus’ little game for old time’s sake. “Is that good enough, your majesty?”

“It has to be,” Klaus replied, drawn out and with a sigh. “Anyway … Lila came around shortly after Allison did and since she came here, she was always hovering around us, tried to strike up a conversation.”

“Why is she here?”

“Nobody knows. She’s telling different stories to everyone. So, I guess she’s either a pathological liar or she is an agent of the Commission.”

“I like your reasoning,” Diego yawned. Of course, there could be a million other reasons why Lila was here or why she was lying to everyone. His gut, however, was never wrong and his gut was telling him that something was up with that woman. “And do you really think she might be one or do you want to indulge me?”

“Well, I guess she really could be an agent. I mean … why not? They would know where to find us and maybe she was sent to keep an eye on us. And … after everything that happened … Would it really be so far-fetched?”

“But why not kill any of us then?” Diego mused. “She would have had some opportunity to do so, right?”

“We are not important, Dee. None of us.” Klaus said and this time there was no mirth, no hidden joke behind his words. They both knew that it was the truth, after all. “They want Five, preferably dead. But we … we don't matter. I mean, without Five we wouldn't have known about the apocalypse the first time nor now, We would have just lived our lives. Well, you might have gotten in trouble with them because of that whole pesky JFK thingamajiggy. But the rest of us, we aren’t a threat. I mean, if anything, they would have even benefitted from Vanya being unattended, right? They want the apocalypse, after all. Do you think she’s alright?”

“As alright as she could be after everything. I guess Five has explained everything to her and probably in a very Five like way.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. So … she would be thoroughly traumatized then, I guess. Poor thing.”

“Do you think she might still be dangerous?”

“I think every last one of us might be dangerous.”

“Yeah, but not in a doomsday kind of way?”

“You sure about that? If Five is right - and he usually is - you would have essentially caused the second apocalypse if you would have killed Oswald. Not all of us might be a nuclear bomb but I guess we all have the potential to fuck shit up really badly.”

“Maybe you are right.” He huffed. “I mean … It wasn't Vanya alone last time either, right? We all had a part to play. I was an ass to her because of her book, this creep manipulated her, Allison belittled her, Luther abused her trust, you … well, I guess you didn't do anything-”

“I threw Dad’s journal in the trash outside” Klaus sighed. “I took this expensive-looking box from his desk for drug money and emptied it into the dumpster. I guess that's where this asshat found it. So … Well, to stick to the bomb analogy, I handed Harold the nuclear codes with a bow on top.”

For a moment they were silent and just hung after their own thoughts. “So when you attacked Lila the other day” Diego then addressed the bright pink elephant in the room. “What really happened?”

“I don't know, Dee,” He sighed. “I just came out of my session with Moncton and she chatted me up. Random nonsense like always. She offered me some water, I took it and then, while she was talking everything just … fell apart.”

“What do you mean?”

“The drugs they give me drown out the ghosts but sometimes I can still hear and see them but it's not like it used to be and … that day with Lila … it just got so loud all around me - like a dozen radios all playing at full blast. I couldn't think straight. I didn't even really … _see_ her … I guess Moncton would say that I had a psychotic episode or something. There were so many ghosts around me, so many voices yelling at me - and I just … I got so angry…”

“Did something like this happen before?”

“No,” Klaus said. “You know me. I’m a pacifist.”

“Mostly.”

“Mostly.”

“Do you think she might have been able to put something in the water she gave you? Why would she even offer you water?” Lila had told him pretty much the same story but something was fishy about it and Diego couldn't tell what it was. Maybe his opinion of her was just so bad that he couldn't imagine her doing something nice for anyone. Was that it? Was his paranoid brain taking over just because Lila had offered a cup of water to his brother?

“She said I looked like I needed it. I mean … maybe she put something in, though I wouldn't know how she would get her hands on any drug that could make me freak out like this. Before she came I was already a little … confused, perhaps. Jeff - Nurse Parker - harassed me before she came along to help me.”

“Well, if she really is part of the Commission, I guess she would know a way or two to make something like this happen.” Diego sighed. “I’m gonna look into this.”

“How?”

“I dunno … I could maybe try to sneak into the records room and have a look in her file.”

“Yeah but … if she really is from the Commission, wouldn't they have done their best to fake her record and make it look believable?”

“You’ve got a point.”

“I have my bright moments sometimes.” Klaus chuckled. 

“We’ll have to find out what her deal is. Maybe … if she’s after Five, I could drop Five’s name next time she’s close enough to hear.”

“I mean … that's as good a plan as any, right?”

※※※※※※※

He was painting a still life in the arts and crafts room when a nurse walked in and told him that he had a visitor. _Five,_ was his first thought after what happened to Diego yesterday. Then again, Five would probably ask for Diego again - otherwise, he would look suspicious if he would suddenly come to see someone else. He exchanged a look with Allison who was across the room trying to paint the same still life that had been set up in the center of the room. She shrugged her shoulder as a way to reply to his questioning, confused look.

“I don't have all day!” The nurse barked and Klaus quickly put his paints away and followed the man through the door, his hands still stained with paint that was slowly drying on his skin and caking under his fingernails and in his cuticles. Other people would find this disgusting but to Klaus, this sensation held great comfort as it reminded him of his childhood. And in a good way, for once.

There hadn't been many good things about his childhood but whenever he had been left alone to draw and paint, those had been rare moments of peace and quiet for him. Reggie had allowed this hobby - mainly because he was a connoisseur of the arts and had thought it best not to interfere with this hobby as it meant Klaus wouldn’t get into more trouble than he already would. These days he knew peace and quiet - a quiet without ghosts around him at all hours of the day - but this quiet was lonely and oddly frightening. He missed Ben. He knew his brother was still around, watching him as he always did but just the fact that he couldn't _see_ Ben … To imagine that his siblings had to feel like this constantly - it was making him sick.

He missed his brother’s sarcastic commentary as if he had a narrator for his life. It was flattering to think that some higher power was narrating his shitshow of a life. 

Until this day, Klaus had never had any visitors in this place. He was a little nervous about it and unfamiliar with the procedure. He didn't really like not knowing what he had to expect of any given situation. Of course, he was a spontaneous guy and he had always been good at finding a way to deal with the weirdest of situations but since he got here, things had changed for him. It was much harder to bullshit his way out of this hellhole when everyone here was trained not to fall for bullshitters and junkies and whatever else. His quick thinking wasn’t getting him anywhere as long as he was here. 

He was led down a narrow corridor, through a set of heavy doors and down another hallway where the patients wouldn't usually be allowed to go. The visitation room was down the hall and the door was already open. He felt his steps faltering a little as he grew more and more nervous. What if it was Vanya? Oh, how he would love to see his sister! Five had told Diego that Vanya was with him, after all, right? Maybe she came to see him and convey more information to him and the rest of their merry band of fuck-ups. As he stepped into the room, however, he felt like the air got knocked out of his lungs.

At the other side of the table, far removed from the open door, sat, clad in the proper uniform of a Marine with the hat discarded on the table, Dave. He looked different than last time. Three years in the Marines had caused him to lose the softness to his face and the youthful naivete to his beautiful blue eyes. He felt his heart break at the sight as he stopped dead on the threshold. He wasn't able to take another step as Dave’s eyes took in his disheveled appearance. 

Suddenly, he wanted to curl up under a rock. He had never felt as self-conscious as he did now, with his hair outgrown and matted and tangled, thin and gaunt, in need of a proper shave and pumped with drugs to keep him calm and quiet. Dave almost looked at him as if he was pitying the man in front of him and only as he was nudged in the back by the nurse that had brought him here, Klaus stepped into the room and slowly walked up to the table to sit down on the chair. He kept his hands cradled in his lap as he did, afraid to be too close to Dave, afraid that he would do something stupid again that would make Dave hate him even more than he already did. He didn't even dare meet his eyes after he sat down. 

“I didn't know if you would remember me,” Dave said out of the blue. “I’m the … the kid you-”

“Harassed?” Klaus couldn't help but snort. “Listen, I’m not in the habit of going around harassing people normally. Of course, I remember you, Dave.” And he hated himself for even talking to him. He shouldn't be talking. He had messed up enough as it was. Come to think about it … He had changed the timeline … was their love even real anymore? Would his past self still travel back in time, end up in Vietnam and fall in love with Dave or would he come straight back home without having learned a thing about love or companionship? Did their love story only exist in his head now? In his memory? Just one more delusion? Would Dave meet a confused young man in a few years' time and fall in love with him and remember that he had seen that same confused young man years ago already as he had tried to warn him from joining the army? 

His head hurt from those thoughts. How was Five always dealing with bullshit like this?

“Okay … Okay…” Dave muttered as if he was trying to collect himself. As he didn't speak again for a few moments, Klaus looked up without lifting his head.

“Why are you here?” He asked carefully, well aware of the nurse keeping watch behind him and the camera that was filming this meeting. Moncton would have a field day with this. He was probably already watching and jerking off to Klaus’ discomfort. 

“I just wanted to-” He shook his head and brushed a hand through his short blonde hair before he huffed a laugh over a joke only he himself understood. “I’m shipping out to Vietnam in a couple of days - after Kennedy’s visit to Dallas. As a matter of fact, I’m about to go back to camp. I was on leave for a few weeks to see my family. It's time to go back now. Before I would go, however, I wanted to … see you. I don't know why … I just had the urge to come and see you. After all, you are the reason why I got enlisted in the first place and it seemed right to draw a line under this chapter of my life so that my thoughts will no longer be occupied by that when I’m over there.”

“Occupied?” Klaus echoed. “By what?”

“You.” Dave shrugged. “You scared the crap out of me back then but I could never quite shake off your words either. You didn't seem crazy to me, you know? When I heard that you ended up here from my Uncle Brian, I had the urge to visit and see if you were treated well. That you got the help that you need. Even if you scared me, you are still a human being and I wanted to see that you are okay. I don't know what made you this way but I know enough about the world and about people to know that people like you have immense amounts of pain in their hearts and I wanted to make sure that someone is helping you, that you are getting better.”

He wanted to laugh but no sound would come over his lips. Dave. Pure, innocent, naive Dave. Despite everything, he still had his best interests at heart. He remembered how he twisted his ankle during his first couple of weeks in ‘Nam and how Dave had dragged him all across the battlefield to get him to safety. He remembered how Dave had hovered by his side when he had been down with a nasty fever and how he had always nudged Klaus to eat and drink and _‘get some meat on those bones’_. The memory made him smile a little. He could still hear him say that with this thick Texan accent. This Dave in front of him still had a few years ahead of him until he would be _his_ Dave. Now he would never become his Dave.

“Are you?” Dave asked as Klaus didn't react to his words. “Getting better?”

“I’m a hopeless case, Davey” He drawled as he leaned back in his chair. “You should better forget me and move on with your life. Even though my point still stands, Dave. You shouldn’t go to Vietnam. You should run away as long as you can. The war that's coming is pointless and we will not win it. Our soldiers will return home traumatized and knowing that they have fought in a pointless war and lost comrades for no fucking reason in the trenches. I’ve seen it, Davey.”

“How?” His question didn't sound mocking. It was the sound of genuine curiosity that made him raise his chin a little to look straight at Dave now.

“I’m a time-traveler” He grinned. If it helped Dave to forget him, to move on, and focus on the war, it was worth Dave thinking he was a complete nutjob. Maybe that would save his life, in the end. “I was there … in Vietnam, with you. You died in my arms in the trenches, shot straight through the chest. Poof, gone, just like that.”

“You are a sick man” Dave muttered but not as an insult and his voice didn't cut. “Maybe I shouldn't have come here. I just wanted to know that you are okay but maybe you are right. Maybe you are a hopeless case.” 

He got up slowly from his chair and took his hat. Klaus watched him walk around the table and pause next to him before he suddenly extended his hand to Klaus. With a questioning look at Dave, he slowly took it and allowed Dave to squeeze his hand before shaking it. 

“I will pray for you, Klaus,” Dave promised. He sounded so sincere that it made his heart ache. Oh, if Dave would only know the things he knew. “And I wish you all the best. I hope, when I return home from Vietnam someday, I will find you outside of this facility and then we can have a beer and laugh about everything. Until then, take care of yourself.”

He watched Dave leave the room until he could no longer see him. After this, everything was a blur. He knew that he was pulled to his feet and dragged down the same corridor he had come from. Nothing mattered though and he felt like he was walking through quicksand. Everything was blurring together. One moment he was in that visitation room, the next he was sitting in the community room on the sofa in front of the black and white rabbit ear TV where the same cartoon was playing over and over and over again. His right leg was pumping up and down, his skin crawled and the air was sizzling around him. There was a voice in his ear, talking to him, warning him but he didn't really listen to it. 

All he heard in his head was Dave’s voice. _I will pray for you, Klaus,_ it said. _Hi, I’m Dave_ , it said. _You are a sick man_ , it said. _I love you_ , it said. 

“Klaus you need to calm down” Another voice suddenly said in his ear. “Klaus your powers-”

He didn't listen to what the voice said but Klaus refused to listen to it and suddenly everything was turned upside down.

**-End of Chapter 8-**


	9. Chapter 9

They sat in silence around the plastic table. The shock about what they had witnessed earlier today was still rendering all three of them completely speechless even hours later as the sun was slowly sinking on the horizon outside of the large windows of the cafeteria. Even now as they sat having dinner, none of them could explain what happened earlier with their brother. They had all been attending different therapies when it happened. Drawn towards the commotion inside the community room, Luther, Allison, and Diego had found themselves standing outside the community room, staring at the havoc that had been raised by something - or rather, _someone_. 

Klaus had been dragged out of the room, knocked out by a heavy tranquilizer. Inside the room, however, couches, tables, and chairs had all been all toppled over, some even broken into a million tiny pieces as if they had been thrown against the surrounding walls by some invisible force. The whole room had looked like a debris field after a bomb had exploded. Without his permission, Diego’s thoughts had immediately wandered back to the day of the apocalypse, when Vanya had brought down the academy. A few other patients had huddled in fear in a corner, the TV completely destroyed and they, his siblings, had been helpless as they had watched how Klaus had been carried away like a rag doll by the nurses. It was this moment when all three of them had realized that Klaus had been responsible for all of this chaos and turmoil. 

After they had sat down for dinner, Allison had, in a low shaky voice, told them what she had witnessed the other day with Klaus and one of the nurses. She had told them both before that she believed Klaus to have other powers without going into much detail about it - but that it would go to this extreme none of them had expected. 

“He has telekinetic powers” Luther finally said quietly in agreement with the story Allison had told them. “Did you know about that?” He turned to Diego but he shook his head immediately. 

“I don't think he knew it either.” Allison sighed in response. “He was just as surprised when he knocked that nurse out the other day. I think the drugs make his powers a lot more unstable and wonky.” A part of him wanted to argue with his sister that she should have told them the details of what had happened the other day, that she had been irresponsible for keeping that from them in a situation like this. Arguing with his sister always came easy and natural to him. That was specifically why he decided to refrain from it too now. 

“I don't get it, though.” Luther chimed in. “The drugs Vanya took suppressed her powers and in Klaus’ case the meds he’s given work wonders against the ghosts too.”

“We don't exactly understand how Klaus’ powers work and how they might differ from Vanya, though,” Diego replied quietly. There was no manual on how their different powers worked, after all. It had taken Diego years to figure out that his powers were not limited to throwing shit real good and holding his breath indefinitely. They hadn't been born with a table of contents for Reginald to read through and understand. None of them had any idea how their powers worked and what influenced them. “Either way, we will have plenty of time to take care of that when we are out of here.”

“Did Five contact you already?” Luther asked again, his voice lowered even more now and his eyes narrowed on Diego. His siblings had been just as surprised about Five’s visit the other day as he was. Earlier, Diego had finally received the message his brother had promised. 

“Yes,” Diego said quietly. He looked around the cafeteria and noticed Lila sitting not too far away at a table. A woman was talking to her and though she seemed to be paying attention, he could sense that she was trying to listen to Diego’s conversation with his siblings. “He sent me a note. It's going down tonight.”

“What about Klaus?” Allison muttered.

“I thought about that,” Diego replied. “He will free one of us first and then he needs to give that person the master key. If we can free ourselves and sneak out and down to the basement, Five can find Klaus and get him out safely. Five just arrived in this time, his powers are probably still a bit wonky. Taking us all with him surely has drained a lot of his energy and he will need to preserve what little energy he has. It's better if he just needs to jump Klaus out of here instead of all three of us.”

“Okay,” Luther nodded. “That's good thinking.”

“Thanks, Number One” Diego rolled his eyes with a snort. Despite the plan that they had come up with, Diego felt a little numb in the face of what was actually going on in this place. They had, after all, no idea where Klaus was currently being kept and what was happening to him right as they were talking.

He caught a glimpse of Lila again. She was staring at him with unconcealed glee and curiosity. She had been there when it happened. She had witnessed the whole thing - which made Diego even more suspicious of her. After all, she had been the person Klaus had attacked a little while ago too. Maybe it was just two instances and yet she seemed always to be there when shit went down with his mostly calm and pacifistic brother who was not known to actually hurt or attack other people without good reason. Maybe she was the common denominator. He still needed to figure out what she did to him - if she had done anything at all. He wondered if she really had put something in the water she had given Klaus. Why else would she have given him something to drink otherwise? She didn't really strike him as a caring person. But if it had been a drug, then what drug and how had she gotten her hands on it? Well, if she was working with the Commission, she would have her ways.

He stayed behind at the table as first Allison and then Luther left the cafeteria to retreat to their rooms. At least his siblings started to feel a bit better or rather more in tune with their powers while Diego was still struggling a little with that. Earlier today he had tried throwing a paintbrush across the room to hit Luther but instead it had just flailed a little and fell to the ground listlessly. Of course, Luther didn't really have a way of testing out his powers without drawing attention towards himself but he had told them at least that he started feeling more like himself, and Allison had successfully rumored the nurse into not giving her her pills earlier today. That was a win, he assumed. 

He acted as if he was still eating as his siblings left, noticing that Lila was still in the room too and he didn't need to wait long until she suddenly sat down beside him. “Have you heard the news?” Lila asked right away, her big eyes trained on him with an intensity that made his skin crawl. 

“What news?” He tried playing dumb.

“Your friend! Klaus!” She grinned. “He’s weird, dude! He did some really crazy stuff earlier!”

“Yeah … I know.”

“I was there when it happened!” She grinned. “It was wild, Man! He just sat there in front of the TV and suddenly he got up like he was electrocuted or something and a wave of energy came out of him like in the comics! And then everything was turned on its head and the furniture crashed against the walls and shit! He almost hit the other patients with the furniture too! And now Moncton wants to do tests on him tonight!”

“What do you mean?” Panic. Yeah, that was exactly the emotion rushing through him and poisoning his system. Panic. “What kind of tests?”

“How would I know?” She snickered. “Probably something really perverse. Electroshocks and … they probably cut his head open to look at his brain or something. I mean, it's not like anyone would miss a crazy bird like him, right? Who knows? Maybe the FBI or the CIA will come to take him in for experimentation, like they did at Roswell, right?”

He wanted to hit her. Diego bit down on his anger, though, and pretended not to care about Klaus’ peril too much. He was aware though that he was doing a piss poor job at that judging by how Lila looked at him. He had never been a very good liar. Reginald had never taught them to lie either, that was why Luther and he were so bad at it. They had only lived to please him - in Diego’s case he had learned eventually that he would never be enough but that didn't change the fact that he had still tried to do what was expected and lying was not something their father had tolerated. 

“Well, I’m out of here anyway tonight” He murmured, deciding to go down a different avenue with Lila now. He was improvising - like a good leader would - and hoping that she would fall for it. “I’m gonna saw through the bars in front of my window.”

“I doubt you’ll get very far.”

“No? Well, you’ll see when I’m gone by tomorrow.” He got up quickly after that to leave the cafeteria. He couldn't deny that Lila’s words made him feel uneasy, though. Of course, it was possible that she had lied to him about his brother and about what happened in the community room but how sure could he really be about that? Maybe now was the time to hone his detective skills and put to use what he had learned in the police academy before he had been kicked out. Well, he had always had a problem with authorities. 

It was his luck that he actually ran into Moncton as he left the cafeteria. “Dr. Moncton!” He called out to the man and caused him to pause in his tracks. To Diego’s surprise, he actually regarded him with a friendly smile. He was holding a file in one hand but Diego couldn't see the name of the patient on it. He could take an educated guess, though as Dr. Moncton quickly pressed the file to his chest to hide the name on it more thoroughly from Diego. 

“Diego,” He replied with a smile, even though he couldn't quite hide the surprise on his face. “What can I do for you?”

“It's just … I wanted to ask about Klaus. Is he okay?”

Moncton sighed and he had expected nothing less of the man. Moncton had probably already suspected Diego to ask about the other patient. They were ‘friends’ after all in Moncton’s world and Diego ‘too attached’ and ‘overprotective’ because of his ‘past trauma’. “I know that he is your friend, Diego, but Klaus is very sick and today he destroyed the community room, scaring other patients and nearly injuring them too. I understand that you are worried about him but I can assure you that Klaus is in safe hands. We had to sedate him and I will personally keep a close eye on him tonight. I’m sure that if we can figure out what happened today, Klaus will soon be back in this unit. Until then we have to separate him from all other patients.”

“I understand,” Diego replied calmly. If he was being kept separate from the other patients, he was probably somewhere in the basement. He knew that there were cells down there too, had seen them on a floorplan of the sanatorium when he first arrived, but those cells weren’t used anymore as far as he knew. The labs and the maintenance rooms were also down in the basement. “I hope he gets better soon.” He then added quietly.

“You had a visitor the other day” Moncton suddenly changed the topic and pushed his glasses a bit higher up his nose again. His attention was now solely resting on Diego again. He had wondered when Moncton would ask about Five. “I saw the young man come in” He saw it on the security video footage. “Who was he? Family?”

“Yeah, he’s my cousin Aidan.” He swiftly commented. Five never wanted a name when all of them received their own names but he knew that ‘Aidan’ had been high on Mom’s list for Five. It seemed weird, though, to think of Five as anything but ‘Five’. “He and his mom are in town for a couple of days and Aidan wanted to see me. That's all.” 

“Oh, that's nice,” Moncton commented but there was no telling if he had eaten up the lie or not. “Are you close to your cousin? He’s quite a bit younger than you are, isn’t he?”

“He’s thirteen, yes” Diego huffed. “Close enough, I would say. We are a family. When I was younger I spent a bit of time with my aunt and was pretty much his live-in babysitter.” Even though he was not the best liar, these lies came surprisingly easy to him. He even managed a smile to sell his story. Moncton stared at him for a moment as if he was trying to analyze his words but then he nodded with a low hum leaving his throat.

“I am glad that your family is watching out for you, Diego. Family bonds are very important, especially for someone on the road to recovery. You should write to the rest of your family, maybe invite them here to visit you more often. It's nice that you made friends with Luther, Allison, and Klaus but you need your family, your brothers and sisters now more than ever.”

“Yeah” Diego replied. “I agree, Doc. I’m heading to bed now.”

“Good night,” Moncton replied. “Try not to worry too much. I’m sure Klaus will be back in no time. I think you have a good influence on him too.” Well, now that took him by surprise! “Since you arrived he is talking a bit more, opening up a little more, and he’s eating better. So, you understand that I am just as much looking forward to having Klaus back in this unit as you are.”

※※※※※※※

Later, as he lay in the darkness of his room on the bed, he stared at the ceiling, nervous if their plan would actually succeed, worried about his brother. It was weird knowing that his brother was not sleeping on the other side of the wall. He was tempted to knock against the wall but he knew that this time he wouldn't hear his knocking echoed by Klaus. Just to think what was happening to Klaus right now while Diego was just lying around uselessly … it made him want to scratch his skin off. Right now his brother might be going through hell and back and then there was still the issue with Lila. Fuck. He was still none the wiser about her. He trusted his gut instinct, however. His gut instinct was rarely wrong and his gut was screaming at him that Lila was bad news. 

Diego found himself counting the seconds while he lied there unable to do anything except be prepared for when Five would inevitably show up. He could only hope that his elusive brother would stick to the god-damn plan and not put their escape off for another day just to be annoying. Avoiding taking his meds became harder and harder each day. He knew that Moncton was already suspicious. Or maybe that was just his paranoid brain getting the better of him again. He couldn't always avoid it either.

He jolted up when he finally heard the sound of his door being unlocked from the other side. His heart was racing, the fear prevalent in his mind that it might be a nurse coming to get him and lock him away again. As the door swung open, however, he could see the silhouette of a boy standing in the semi-darkness of the hallway and was a little confused why Five had not just teleported into the room in the first place. Maybe Five had come to the same conclusion as Diego and was trying to save as much of his battery as possible. 

“It was about time” Diego whispered and quickly got off his bed as Five stepped inside.

“Where are the others?”

“Don't worry about them.” Diego extended his hand to Five, the palm upwards as he was asking for the keys. “Give me the keys and I’m gonna get them out, Allison and Luther.”

“I can just jump-”

“No, you need to find Klaus.”

“What about him?” Now his brother’s voice was laced with concern. He was honestly surprised by that reaction but who knew what was going on in Five’s head? He had learned as a child that it was always best not to question Five too much. All it would get him was a headache. 

“I don't know.” He replied. “He … Allison said he might have more powers and- Listen, it’s a long story and we don't have time for that right now. All you need to know is that he was taken away and got separated from all the other patients. I think he might be locked up somewhere in the basement area. There are a few old cells down there that are not in use - and the labs and shit. He might be in serious danger, okay? If you would jump around with us, you might lose your energy too quickly and who knows if we need your powers later.”

“What about you?” Five asked lowering his brows, a steep line appearing between them.

“We’ll find a way out.” He reassured as Five finally gave the keys to him. He closed his fist around them, not questioning how Five had gotten those. “We have stopped taking our meds as much as possible, so, if it would come to it, at least Allison could try rumoring people.”

“We’ll meet outside then.” Five decided. “There is a car parked further down the street.”

“What car?”

“You’ll know, trust me.” He could tell that Five was about to jump but then he paused again, his eyes as sharp as always as he looked at Diego in the semi-darkness of his room. “What about that lady that's possibly from the commission?”

“I don't know. Just be careful.” Five nodded and then finally teleported away leaving Diego with the mission to free their siblings and escape the asylum. _Okay_ , he thought, _I can do this_. Easy. He was a vigilante, he was a superhero. He could do this.

Slowly and as silently as a cat, Diego crept out of the room and closed the door behind him so that the security guard would not notice his disappearance right away. Usually, there would be no reason for his heart to beat as fast as it did right now but nothing about this situation was the norm for him or his siblings. He knew that he was at constant danger of being noticed or caught and then drugged and locked away. Well, if that would happen, Five could still break him out, he assumed. Yet, the thought left him uneasy. He needed a win, desperately. So, he took his time to walk down the corridor towards Luther’s cell, always ready to hide or attack if it would be necessary. As things were, however, he wanted to avoid attacking anyone. 

He reached Luther’s room without incident and made quick work of unlocking the door and letting his brother, who was already waiting near the door, out. The hardest part about all of this was to avoid the cameras so as to not draw suspicion towards themselves. They managed to reach Allison’s room and free their sister and as they were headed towards the stairs, Diego was growing more and more uneasy about all of this. It was all going too smoothly. With their family, things going smoothly was always a bad sign. 

They didn't speak as they maneuvered through the building, evading cameras or, if it couldn't be helped, destroying them. The master key that Five had managed to obtain, opened even the securely locked door that was leading out of their unit and towards the administration and staircase. There was no alarm as they walked through, no one yelling for them. He felt his skin crawl as they reached the stairs. The moment they walked through the door to the staircase, however, gunshots destroyed the tranquility of the nightly sanatorium.

※※※※※※※

It helped that he had looked at a floor plan before he had freed his brother Diego from his room. If anything, it made Five find what he was looking for much quicker than he would have otherwise and swiftness was of the essence right now. They wouldn't have much time until they would be found out. 

Of course, Five wasn’t too opposed to the idea of fighting his way out of here but, in the end, the people here were innocent. Assholes, yes, but innocent nonetheless. As he maneuvered through the basement of the sanatorium, he could only hope that everything would go smoothly for his siblings. What Diego had said about Klaus, however, left Five feeling a bit uneasy. It wasn’t too surprising that Klaus was showing the potential for more powers, all things considered - though now was maybe the worst time for new and unexplored powers.

At least Five had it under good authority that Klaus would probably not be the cause of the next apocalypse. 

The lower level of the sanatorium was abandoned this late at night. It had been midnight when he had reached his brother’s room. Only a handful of staff was roaming this place at this hour of the night. A couple of nurses who would take care of emergencies throughout the night, nightguards who would be patrolling the corridors every once in a while. Regardless, Five was careful as he walked the halls of the sanatorium. He wanted to draw as little attention as possible until he had found his brother. Just thinking that Klaus might have shown some new power and had been seen doing so … the possibilities of what was happening to Klaus right now as he crept through the silent sanatorium seemed endless and none of them good in any shape or form. 

Five hurried down a narrow corridor and found the empty cells Diego had talked about. They seemed to have not been in use for a couple of years by now, the doors were unlocked, some even open. He noticed a sign pointing in the direction of the labs that they had down here in the basement and the thought of a sanatorium having labs made him feel a little bit queasy. It reminded him entirely too much of his short-lived time at the academy. Too vivid was his recollection of the experiments and tests his father had performed on him and on his siblings. 

Down the corridor, around a corner, and through a double-winged door, Five finally found the laboratories, all hidden behind a set of doors down the narrow hallway in front of him. This corridor was a dead end. No other door was leading further into the building or outside. The doors had very slim glass windows in them that would allow passersby a small glance into the room behind the door. 

In the back of his mind, there was a sense of deja vu. Not too long ago, fuck … only two days ago, he had walked through a secret laboratory of sorts too. This started to become a theme and Five didn't know if he quite liked that theme. The first two rooms were empty and didn't seem to hold any nefarious purpose. He saw only a couple of desks and regular lab equipment. Maybe some of the doctors here were researching new kinds of drugs. Well, as long as they didn't test them on their patients without consent…

The third door he checked, however, wasn’t empty. There was an uncomfortable-looking bed in the center of the room, floors and walls were covered in off-white tiles for easier cleaning. A few cabinets along the walls held all kinds of drugs and medical equipment. The room was, despite the late hour, illuminated by a loud neon lamp on the ceiling and on the bed, lay his brother Klaus - even though it took Five a moment to recognize the man and link that gaunt looking figure to the same brother who had smashed a snow globe on his head only a couple of days ago.

His hair was so long that it probably reached below his shoulder blades. He looked thinner than ever, his skin sickly pale. His eyes were closed but he doubted that he was actually asleep. Unsurprisingly, he was tied very securely to the bed with a couple of leather straps that didn't allow him to do as much as wriggle. Next to the bed, a monitor surveyed Klaus’ vitals. Even from outside the room, he was able to tell that his vitals seemed normal. At least he was okay, Five thought, even though Klaus looked rough.

He opened the door without precautions. If someone was in there watching over Klaus - which he doubted - Five would make quick work of them and the faster he would grab his brother and be out of here, the better. Klaus barely reacted to the sound of the door and after Five had entered, he noticed the other gadgets around the room - like the one he knew was used for electroconvulsive therapy. Fuck. If they had shocked Klaus, there was no surprise that he seemed so out of it as Five approached him. 

The moment Five reached his brother, Klaus groggily opened his eyes. His brother’s usually so vibrant green eyes looked dull and lifeless and it took Klaus a moment to actually find him and acknowledge his presence. He opened his mouth and tried to say something but all that escaped his throat was an unintelligible mumbling sound. It pained him more than it had any right to seeing his brother like this. Ever since he had found his siblings dead in the apocalypse, it had been his goal to prevent anything of that sort from happening, to prevent his siblings from getting hurt. And now four of his siblings were in an insane asylum and one of them pumped so full of drugs that he couldn't speak.

“Don't worry” He mumbled more to himself than Klaus as he was already cutting him free. Good thing that he had at least packed one or two of Diego’s knives. His brother would be delighted to be reunited with his bondage gear again later. After talking about it with Vanya, they had decided that Five should get his siblings’ personal belongings out of this place as well as to not leave any tracks. He had done that before he went to Diego - just in case everything went haywire. “I’m getting you out of here.”

Klaus was freed in no time and Five helped him to sit up. His brother was as weak as a newborn fawn as he did though and that made Five momentarily hesitate. Could he teleport with his brother when he was this weak? What if it would be too much of a strain on him? 

“Oh, how sweet” A voice suddenly cooed from behind him and Five cursed himself for not being more vigilant. As he whirled around he saw a young woman standing there with brown skin and huge dark eyes. She grinned in a way as a child would on Christmas eve as she saw him standing right in front of her. The expression on her face seemed all wrong, though. There was glee in her eyes, yes, but her smile held too many teeth. “The old man takes care of his little brother. I wished I had a camera but I guess … well, your head on a silver platter will suffice.”

“Who are you?”

“Don't you know that?”

“You are from the Commission but who are you exactly?”

“Why is that important?” The woman huffed and slowly sauntered into the room. He needed to be careful. If she had been trained by the commission and sent here to kill him or his siblings, he needed to be sharp and focussed - which was almost impossible with his brother at his side who so clearly would be too weak to save himself or get out of harm’s way at the very least. 

“You’re right it’s not!” Five grinned. He acted quickly as he teleported away from Klaus and across the room to where the woman was and then, as he was at the spot she had occupied and aimed the knife for her neck, she was no longer in the same spot. The woman gave a sharp whistle, prompting Five to whirl around. It had all happened in under two seconds and yet she was on the other side of the room, standing next to the bed in the center, a knife in her hand, right beside his helpless brother. 

It seemed like it all happened in slow-motion as she plunged her knife in his brother’s chest. It was like the world stopped turning, as if time stopped. He forgot how to breathe for a second there, his brain unable to comprehend what just happened. Something inside of him was snapping, breaking apart - a connection severed.

He had seen his brother Klaus dead already - lying under the rubble of the academy - but seeing him getting killed … _seeing him getting killed…_

As the woman pulled the knife out, Klaus coughed up blood almost immediately only for her to plunge the knife back in with an expression of glee and a shrill laugh bubbling out of her throat, as blood was dripping down his brother’s face. She had executed the attack with the precision of a professional killer. She had destroyed both his lungs with just two stabs of her blade. A fatal wound. there was no coming back from this.

“You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for that!” She grinned as Five stared in horror. “He was grinding my gears! If he had just played along nicely and if this dingus Diego would have just not been such a stuck up little bitch, everything would have gone much smoother! You know, my plan was to come here, get one of your bastard siblings to trust me, escape with them, getting close to you, and then just hand you to the Commission. I was putting my money on Diego, actually. He seemed the perfect candidate for a bit of a seduction act, you know? But your siblings had to screw it all up!” 

Once more she pulled the knife out of his brother’s chest to push it back in and rip it out almost immediately. Overkill. She wouldn't have needed that extra stab. Klaus was already dead before. The manic glint in her eyes told a story of revenge and hatred. She was no normal Commission agent. Even as his brain registered all of this, even as Klaus finally fell off the bed and landed on the ground with his blood rapidly pooling around him, Five was still unable to move. He had to, though, as the woman suddenly jumped at him, the knife at the ready and then- The woman stopped dead in her tracks. Her eyes turned white like it appeared whenever Allison was rumoring someone and then her whole body became limp as she stood there right in front of Five, her arms hanging loosely by her side, the knife almost slipping from her grip, her jaw slack.

His eyes shot to his brother on the ground and he saw Klaus lying there in a pool of his own blood, his eyes wide open and - completely white. Before he could do anything or even remotely grasp anything that happened, the woman raised her knife again and, with one swift motion, cut her own throat from ear to ear, leaving only one gruesome wound - a slash so deep it couldn't be fixed. The knife dropped from her grasp, her eyes regained their brown color as she was starting to choke and gasp for air, clutching her torn throat in panic. She tried grasping for him but Five teleported out of the way and to his brother’s side as the woman fell to the ground and found her end as a twitching mess bleeding out on the floor. 

As he dropped to the floor next to Klaus, he didn't care for the blood staining his clothes. _His brother’s blood._ He was kneeling in a puddle of his brother’s blood. Klaus’ eyes were still open, green once more and devoid of any life. He looked like he had when Five had found him in the apocalypse and right then and there, Five felt like he was losing his mind. He had been too late. Again.

**-End of Chapter 9-**


	10. Chapter 10

As they rushed down the street, all Diego could think about was getting his siblings to safety. The moment those three albino weirdos had started shooting at them, they had floored it. Diego had risked only one look at those three guys and bailed and he wasn’t even ashamed to admit it. He hadn't seen much of them, only that it had been three men with very light blonde hair and very dangerous looking guns that they had aimed at them. 

As soon as they had managed to barge through a door and into the fresh night air, it seemed like a true miracle that they escaped with their life. Whoever those people were, they had been after them. Now they only needed to find the right car but they could not possibly wait for Five if he was not already there - not with those people going after them. 

“What car did he say?” Luther called over his shoulder as they ran down the street. Behind them, the alarm inside the sanatorium was going off. Soon there would be guards and police swarming this area. They didn't have time to waste.

“He said we would know!”

“And you didn't ask him to elaborate?”

“Guys!” Allison pointed down the road. There was a figure standing next to a black car. In the darkness, the car seemed almost invisible so far down the road. The figure standing next to it though was petite, very pale, with long dark hair. “Oh my God!” Allison cheered. She was not usually faster than her brothers but right now she mobilized everything she had to rush towards their sister standing at the side of the road. Diego noticed the license plate only as they were a good hundred feet away from the car. _HERMES_ , it read and almost made him stop dead in his tracks. 

There was no time to be shocked, no time to be angry - not as they could hear guard dogs barking somewhere behind them and shots being fired on the premises of the sanatorium. He saw Allison and Vanya hug before quickly getting into the backseat. Luther reached the car before Diego and jumped into the passenger’s seat. As he approached the car, he could see that someone was sitting on the driver’s seat and scurried in behind Allison to join his sisters in the backseat. The moment the door closed, the driver sped down without even asking about Five. The old geezer would know where to find them, he assumed - and yet his heart was racing with worry.

He was still out of breath as he realized that the man in the driver’s seat was not actually Reginald and felt a little bit of relief wash over him at that. The driver was wearing the proper uniform like the driver, George, that they used to employ when the academy had still been in full swing. He was not saying anything as he maneuvered the car down the road. Just like George back in the day, he hardly paid them any attention. He was here to do a job and that was it.

“Where’s Five?” Vanya’s voice pulled him from his thoughts and made him look at his sister again. She was sitting between him and Allison and yet it was as if she was unreachable to Diego even as their shoulders brushed. For him it was only a couple of weeks since he had last seen her and yet it seemed like a lifetime. She seemed a little changed the way she was holding herself and looking at her siblings - no longer trying to disappear into thin air or destroy the moon. “And Klaus?”

“Five wanted to find Klaus and get him out. We got separated earlier today.” Allison explained after she had gotten her breath back under control. “Is this Dad’s car?”

“Yeah” Vanya huffed. “Apparently.”

“Don't tell me … Five actually asked Dad for help?” Luther asked as he turned in his seat to look at her. There was a softness to Luther’s blue eyes as he looked at Vanya that Diego had never seen before. Well, his brother had spent a year in the nuthouse, after all. He had learned a few things, realized a few things. Diego, however, was still a bit torn about Vanya. He needed time to figure everything out. Too much had happened too quickly.

“I … Uhm” Vanya said. “I think … Five should better explain everything … I mean, I’m not too sure either… My memory is kinda foggy and I’m still not completely certain that this weird little guy is not completely crazy…”

“Yeah” Allison laughed and broke the tension with that. “Me neither.”

※※※※※※※

He was hesitant as they walked into the mansion. Sure, the building had nothing on the academy, as far as he could see from the outside but that didn't have to mean anything - knowing his father. Of course, he had known that Reginald was still alive in this timeline. Luther had told him, after all, how he made contact with the old man before the sanatorium. However, the possibility of actually meeting his father again had not crossed his mind until he had seen the car parked down the road from the sanatorium. 

What kind of man was Reginald in 1963? Was he already that cruel man that would become their father in a little over twenty years? He had seen all his father’s achievements proudly displayed in the academy. He remembered the Reginald they had gotten to experience whenever they had joined him on social events - well-spoken, polite, sometimes almost funny and charming, though arrogant to the core.

They were accompanied by the chauffeur and Vanya into the house after the man had parked in front of the entrance of the mansion. Although there were a good two-hundred feet between the door and the street and although the property was separated from the road by a proper fence and a fancy gate, they still hurried into the mansion as to not draw attention in their white in-patient uniforms.

Diego almost expected Five to snark at them immediately as they entered the house but the silence that greeted them as they stepped into the foyer, was almost deafening. He could only hear the sound of the pendulum of the old grandfather clock in the corner of the foyer swing from one side to the other and the shifting of the house as it settled around them. The interior was immediately so starkly different from the academy that it almost gave him whiplash. While the academy was Victorian in many aspects of its furnishing and decor, this house screamed art-deco in style. Well, his father had property all over the world and they had only seen a handful of those places during their life at Reginald’s side. The academy, however, was the oldest of Reginald's houses and his most favored too. 

Diego was almost a bit afraid that his father would soon come down the lavish staircase to greet them - or to scowl at them and belittle them - but nothing of that sort happened. There was so much anger inside of him that he didn't know how he would react to confronting this man. This man, who was not yet his father. This man who had not yet abused and tortured and manipulated and destroyed them. 

Would it be unfair to unleash his anger upon Reggie before he had even done anything? Wasn't it dangerous for the timeline that they were here at all and in contact with this man? What if this event would change the timeline and prevent Reginald from adopting them? What if he would adopt seven different kids instead? Or had this already happened before? Had their father known what was coming in 1989 and had known where to find them because he had already met them in the past as adults?

He had a headache. He wanted to sleep for years.

“You are hurt” Vanya addressed him and as she tried to touch his arm where a bullet had nicked him, he almost flinched away. “Sorry, I didn't mean to…”

“Excuse me for being a bit weary” Diego huffed and Allison glared. “What? I’m sorry, Allison, but last time I saw her she had suspended me in mid-air and was sucking the life out of me with energy tentacles!”

“I’m ...sorry?” Vanya said again and the way she looked at him now, mirth and a badly concealed, quietly amused little smirk pulling at her lips, Diego couldn't help but huff a breath out in response before he pulled her into a quick hug. It was actually weird hugging Vanya. He couldn't recall ever having hugged her. They had never been close as children nor as adults - especially not as adults thanks to her book. He could understand her a little better now, though. A part of him knew now why she had thought it was necessary to write that book. 

“Five!” Allison suddenly exclaimed as Diego let go of Vanya again but not without tousling her hair. His other sister had ventured off to one of the archways that were opening into different rooms to either side of the lobby - much as it was inside the academy. From what he could tell, Allison was staring into some sort of living room that was dimly lit by a fire in a grand marble fireplace and by a few lamps around the room. “You’re here, good! Where’s-”

He knew that something was wrong as they all followed their sister into the living room without Five looking at them from where he was sitting in an armchair. It took Diego a moment to realize that Five was covered in blood. He didn't seem hurt, though. Then again, seeing Five covered in the blood of other people was not exactly rare. Something about the way his brother was sitting completely still and silent on that armchair, however, made his throat close up. Something was wrong. He could feel it in the air and twisting in his gut. He knew it even before Allison walked around the sofa that was standing opposite of the fireplace and let a scream leave her throat.

“Klaus!” She called and rushed over to the sofa while Diego felt rooted to the spot. “Klaus! Oh my God! What happened? What happened to him?” 

He saw Five open his mouth and how Luther was carefully pulling Allison away from the sofa as she hovered next to it but he couldn't hear anything. It was all white noise in his head all of a sudden as he moved like on autopilot until he was standing next to the sofa and was staring down at his brother’s pale face. 

Klaus’ white uniform was almost black from all the dried blood. _His_ blood. It had dried into his beard and skin after it had run out of his mouth and then down his neck - a stark contrast to his deathly pale skin. His eyes were closed and if it wouldn't be for all the blood, he would look like he was sleeping. 

He was dead though. His brother was dead and Diego’s whole world turned on its head.

※※※※※※※

They sat in silence around the fireplace in the unfamiliar living room. Diego, Allison, and Luther were still all dressed in their in-patient uniforms and had no wish to change. The desire to have a shower and proper food was low as well. Diego had listened to his siblings talk for a while, as he sat next to Vanya on one of the lavish sofas. He listened to Five explaining what happened after he had finally managed to open his mouth to finally speak. 

Lila. He had known it. 

He should have trusted his gut more and stabbed her the moment he had had the opportunity to do so. The way Five described her death made little sense to anyone in the room, of course, but to Diego, it wasn't important to understand. He couldn't care less about how she died. The only thing he was glad to hear was that she had suffered and that her death had been slow and painful. She deserved nothing less for stabbing his brother. His brother, who had already been helpless and weak. His brother whom Diego had failed yet again to protect. 

He thought about how he had found Klaus after his first overdose. He had promised himself back then that he would take better care of him, that he would better protect him. And now his brother was dead and there was nothing that could be done. 

After that, Five had told him the story of how he had made contact with their father to set up a base of operations and how he managed to convince the old man of who he was. Apparently, it had something to do with reciting Homer in old greek and Five snooping around a secret research facility where he had met a baby version of Pogo. 

In all honesty, Diego didn't have the patience nor the strength to actually listen to that story. Then Vanya had explained how Five had found her on that farm of the woman who had hit her with her car and nursed her back to health until Five arrived and how she still couldn't quite believe what he had told her. But here she was regardless. In the mansion of their abusive father who was not yet their abusive father and had not yet damaged them beyond repair. By some miracle, Five had managed to make Vanya believe his crazy story.

“What do we do now?” Vanya asked after an eternity of silence.

“I’ve got Hazel’s suitcase” Five muttered. “It was damaged after he gave it to me because we were attacked by those three Swedish assholes that got him killed but I am in the process of repairing it - with Dad’s help no less. Handing a portable time machine to our father was not exactly my brightest idea, I admit but I wouldn't have been able to do it alone. Not without Ben. Ben was the tinkerer of us. Anyway … as soon as it's done, we can use it to go back home.”

“I meant…” Vanya said again and pointed quietly at the dead body of their brother on the sofa. “with him … we can't just … let him lie there … he needs a funeral.”

“He’ll get one.” Five decided for them all. “When we are back home. He will rest beside Ben.”

Diego felt sick hearing his siblings talk like this - as if … Yes, what? As if Klaus wouldn't return to them? But that was the point, wasn't it? He was dead. He wouldn't return. A part of him wondered if Klaus was still hovering around them like Ben apparently did after his death. What a horrible thought. It wasn’t comforting to think that his brother might be there watching him. If he was dead … he wanted him to be at peace.

“Where are you going?” Luther asked and only then Diego realized that he had gotten up from where he had been sitting. 

“I just … I need” What? What did he need? Where did he want to go? “I … Um … I-I n-need”

“Come” Allison smiled at him as she too got up and bridged the distance between them. She took his arm. “We’ll get fresh air.” He nodded, never more thankful for her than at that moment as she took charge. He thought about how he had almost lost her too only a few weeks ago. He remembered finding her lying in her own blood. Now, she was gently leading him away from the others. They didn't get very far. The moment they walked towards the archway, however, a figure appeared in it - tall and intimidating like the figure from his nightmares.

“Ah, good, you are all here now,” Sir Reginald Hargreeves said and, as always, his face did not portray any kind of emotion. He looked younger, his hair not yet grey, the wrinkles around his eyes not yet as pronounced. “I see your plan has worked out fine. Well, this time machine you gave me is almost about ready as well.” 

He didn't even look at Diego or Allison, his attention directed solely on Five - as if they didn't exist. He didn't know if he was glad that their father didn't acknowledge their existence or if it only fueled his anger. Right now, he felt numb. After Eudora’s death and after he had been forced to switch off his mother, his emotions had run hot, his anger had been flaring but right now he was just ... numb. He didn't feel anything. He wasn't angry or sad. He felt … nothing. Nothing at all. Maybe that should concern him a lot more than it actually did but even concern seemed out of the question right now. He was left only with a dull ache where his heart was supposed to be. He felt as if he was missing a limb. As if a part of him was missing. 

Reginald walked past both him and Allison without acknowledging them after they stepped back a little. They watched their father walk around the sofa and cast a look at their dead brother after no one talked. For a moment, Reginald’s face was unreadable but then he straightened his back and gave a little hum.

“I see,” He said as if there wasn’t a corpse lying on his sofa. His face portrayed no emotion and Diego harbored no illusions about the fact that their Reginald, future Reginald, would have looked any different in this situation. “It was good that you brought him with you. We wouldn't want to leave traces of you being here. I would have appreciated it, however, if you would have refrained from laying your dead brother on my sofa. I will have to burn it after you go back to your own time.”

Before anyone could react, Luther had jumped from his seat and grabbed the man by the collar of his expensive suit. Everything escalated after that. Luther was attacking their father, Five was trying to pull him back, Vanya seemed scared shitless at the display, Allison tried reasoning with Luther to let their father go as he was choking the man, and Diego was rooted to the spot, unable to do anything, not knowing what to do. 

It was a gasp, the tiniest sound he had ever heard, that suddenly stopped everything that was going on.

※※※※※※※

He was floating. Floating in the vast expanse of space. He didn't know where he was and neither did he care about it. He was trapped somewhere between time and space, floating, floating, floating beyond the stars. He felt peace. Maybe for the very first time in his life. He felt like he did when he woke up in the afterlife - before he met God on a bike. Peace. He knew what this feeling was. He knew that this was what death felt like. He had felt it before - perhaps more often than he realized. Death. Well, he wasn’t even sad. He felt relief. 

Life was pain and sadness for the most part. 

And then, regretfully, he started to feel a tingling in his hands and in his feet. As the tingling started to spread through his body, he knew that he was being ripped away from that peaceful little paradise he had found himself in. And then, before he could fully grasp what was happening to him, he was pulled to the surface in a flash - so quickly that it left him feeling out of breath and made him gasp like a drowning man, his eyes flying open.

At first, he didn't see anything at all, and just as fear of blindness started taking a hold of him, a room started to take shape around him as if it was being chiseled out of nothing while he was watching it all happen. He saw a coffered ceiling in oak timber, high walls with rich red wallpapers, and gold accents all over the place. It smelled like fire and blood. There were voices speaking in hushed, yet excited voices.

“Klaus?” Someone asked and their voice sounded like it was trembling, scared, and worried.

“Marvelous!” Another voice exclaimed. He knew that one. It had followed him into his nightmares since he was a little boy. “Extraordinary!” The voice sounded a little hoarse. “Immortality!”

“Klaus?” Another voice. This one he hadn't heard in a hot minute. “Hey, you’re okay” _Ben_. He could feel him hovering, see him next to wherever he was lying. He could see the deep worry lines on his forehead. He had seen Ben look at him like that a million times in the past and he had hoped that he would never need to see it ever again since he had gotten clean. “The others are all here too - and Dad. Don't freak out, okay? Remember where you are. Remember _when_ you are. You’re safe.”

“What happened?” He managed to groan but his throat felt as if it was lined with sandpaper.

“You scared the shit out of us, that happened!” Five suddenly hissed. There were hands on him - big, strong, calloused. Diego’s hands. He knew those hands. It were the hands that had pushed him over when he was fourteen just to fuck with him, the same hands that were outstretched in a silent offer of help every time he had fallen too low to get up by himself. 

“You were dead” Diego’s voice sounded strange. He didn't sound like he had cried, but it still sounded hoarse and exhausted, there was a tremble to it that Klaus couldn't quite figure out where it came from. “You were dead.” 

Finally, he could actually see Diego as he turned his head, unable to move his body more than an inch at a time. His siblings were all there, just like Ben had told him. Vanya looked completely shaken up. She was pale, her eyes almost drained of all color. Allison had tears on her cheeks that he wanted to wipe away. Luther’s face was red from anger that was only slowly seeping out of him and Five looked … old. As he took another glance at Diego, his eyes looked haunted and had this far-away look to them that he would always get when he didn't know how to deal with a situation, retreating back into his own mind to escape. 

“Lila stabbed me” He murmured after a moment as it slowly all came back to him. “I remember.” 

He remembered being in that room, remembered the electroshocks, and remembered the way Moncton had looked at him as if he was just a frog on a metal table. He remembered the fear that had struck him as Moncton had talked about how the FBI would be interested in him. He remembered being left alone in that room for hours until Five came - until Lila came. He remembered the pain, remembered the expression on Five’s face as it happened, remembered knowing that this was it - the end. He remembered the rage he had felt towards this woman, the agony of knowing the pain his siblings would experience from his death. He remembered a blade gliding through his skin and tearing open his neck. He remembered dying. 

His hand flew up to his neck but there was nothing. He remembered feeling the blood pour out of the wound and staring at his own body on the ground. 

“I have a headache.”

※※※※※※※

Klaus was, quite honestly, surprised by his father’s hospitality. Well, he wasn’t technically his father yet and he was probably just being helpful because he was intrigued by their powers. Still, he felt better and was thankful after he climbed out of the warm water of the tub. A proper shave and a haircut made him feel like himself again. Allison had helped him with that. She had hummed a soft tune while cutting off his tangled mess of hair. Her hands had been gentle as she had dragged her fingers over his scalp and although she hadn't said anything and although he had acted as if he wouldn't notice, he had seen the tears in her eyes. It had taken a while until he had fully understood how afraid his siblings had been for him, how shocked and destroyed by his death. 

A while ago, a lifetime ago, while he had still been out on the streets, he had been certain that no one in his family would ever care whether he died or not. He could now see how dumb and selfish and cruel this assumption had been. Diego had always been there when he had needed him, after all, and he knew that even Allison, Vanya, and Luther would have helped him if he had asked them to in the past. He could see that now. Back then, however, he thought that they wouldn't waste a tear on him. 

As he looked in the mirror, however, he still didn't look like himself. He looked pale and lifeless. He looked like a ghost. He felt like a ghost too.

“It's the eyeliner” Ben helpfully addressed him as he leaned against the bathroom door and watched him as if he was afraid Klaus might drop dead again. He knew that all his siblings seemed to think something like that judging by the way they were hovering around him since he came back from the dead. A part of him felt silly for taking a bath and having his hair cut. He was holding them back. They should have just gone back to their time already. 

“I guess you’re right.” He muttered. “I don't suppose I’m gonna find one in Dad’s bathroom, though.” 

“It would be a surprise.” Ben hummed in agreement. There was a joke there somewhere on the tip of his tongue but Klaus couldn't quite … reach it. “How are you feeling?”

Yes, how was he feeling? The love of his life was headed to Vietnam to die a senseless death there. He had been killed by someone from the Commission just for shits and giggles. He had spent three years in a fucking asylum with his brain being picked apart every day. He had been shocked and locked up and drugged out of his mind. Not to mention the withdrawal symptoms that he was already experiencing. His siblings had it easier. They had had time to adjust already while they had slowly weaned off their meds. Klaus was going cold turkey right now - again. It would be a mess. _He_ would be a mess. 

“I’m fine” He replied and turned around to face Ben. “Have you been there? The entire time?”

“Of course” Ben smiled softly. “I wouldn't leave you alone in such a place. I was there. I tried talking to you but you couldn't see me anymore. It was scary, I’m not gonna lie.”

“Thank you” He whispered. “For watching out for me.”

“I just wished I could have helped you or protect you from that bitch.”

“It's not your fault.” He replied quickly. “I got myself into this situation. I mean … It's the ‘60s and I ran around like … well, like myself. I should've … toned it down … I guess.”

“Hey, no” Ben snapped his fingers in front of his face as if he actually needed to gain his attention. He used to do that a lot during the time Klaus had lived on the streets. Mostly, Ben had done this when Klaus had been hurt or so out of it that he couldn't understand the danger he was in. He met Ben’s dark eyes, afraid of what he might find in there. So much was left unsaid between them because Klaus was afraid to have this conversation. Ben had been there - from the start. He had seen everything. He knew everything. “You didn't do anything wrong. You wanted to save Dave, that's all. And you ran into homophobic fucking assholes. They are wrong, not you.”

“I know … I know.” There was a knock on the door that almost made him flinch. Not a second later, Diego was sticking his head into the room. 

“Everything okay?” He murmured but Klaus noticed that his brother barely really looked at him. “I’ve got something to wear for you here. Five says … we can postpone going back home for a few more hours if you don't feel up to it yet.”

“No … No … We should go as quickly as possible. We already wasted too much time because of me.” For a moment, they just stood there, both not really knowing what to say to the other. Ben, invisible to Diego, groaned after a while of that.

“Jesus Christ, just hug it out already!” He exclaimed and would have shoved Klaus if he would have the strength to make him corporal. “Diego was terrified for you! He was devastated when you were dead! Hug him already, you moron!” 

Klaus hesitated another moment but, in the end, he bridged the distance between him and his brother and did as he was told. Diego reciprocated the hug right away, squeezing him so tightly that Klaus was almost sure he wouldn't be able to breathe. It was like being hugged by an anaconda. And yet it felt good. He felt grounded. 

“Don't ever do something like this again, dumbass” Diego muttered and finally let go of him again before he gently punched Klaus’ shoulder. “You scared me.”

“I’m sorry” He replied and rubbed the spot Diego had just assaulted with his fist. As Diego rolled his eyes at the display, Klaus actually managed a small smile. “I try to keep dying to a minimum from now on.”

※※※※※※※

Time travel was just something he would never get used to and he sincerely hoped that he wouldn't need to get used to it anyway. This was Five's hobby and he didn't want to take that from him. Five always got grouchy when he thought that someone was taking something from him - like the time when they were seven years old and Five thought that Klaus had taken his teddy away. Well, he had taken his teddy - but only as retaliation after Five had messed with his coloring book. 

When they landed in the reception hall of the academy, he almost keeled over as he lost his balance. It was Diego stopping that from happening as he closed his hand around his biceps to keep him steady. Dizzily, he grabbed for Diego’s other arm just to ground himself until the world stopped spinning like a fucking dickhead.

“I can't believe it!” Allison exclaimed. “We’re back home!” 

Everything was there. The hall, the lavish staircase, the paintings, the rich carpets, the dust particles in the air, the smells, Mom humming from another room. Mom. Mom was alive and here. Pogo too. Everyone was alive. The nightmare was over and-

“Ben?” It was Luther’s voice calling their dead brother’s name. Klaus whirled around to follow Luther’s look towards the doorway of the sitting room. He expected to see his brother standing there cast in that same blue light as he usually was when Klaus made him visible. He wasn’t though. For a second, Ben just stared at Luther, then at his hands. Vanya was closest to him and it was her who bridged the distance and reached out to touch him. Her hand collided with Ben’s shoulder and then she hugged him as fiercely as she possibly could. 

“What…” Klaus murmured.

“Dad” Five said quietly as they watched Allison and Luther hugging Ben after Vanya finally let go of him with tears streaming down her face. Diego was next in line after he had let go of Klaus while tears were flowing freely and laughter filled the halls of the academy. “Vanya told him about Ben’s death.”

“You mean…” Klaus began but had a hard time wrapping his head around everything. He felt like he was badly lagging behind in all this. Time travel was a bitch and he would never be able to keep up with all those different timelines and changes. “You mean he prevented it? Ben never died in this timeline?”

“Apparently” Five grinned at last. “Apparently, the Umbrella Academy finally did something good for once.”

**-End of Chapter 10-**


	11. Chapter 11

Ben lived. He still couldn't quite believe it but here they were. He could touch and hug his brother - the same brother that had followed him around for the last thirteen years, his personal Jiminy Cricket.

“Does that mean” Ben began as he took another drag from the cigarette and handed it back to Klaus. They were sitting on the windowsill in the attic where they used to smoke pot together with Diego when they were sixteen. That had stopped, of course, after Ben’s death in their original timeline. “I never followed you around in this timeline? That my memories of those years of you on the street are now all fake?”

“I don't know, Benny-boy.” Klaus sighed. “I have really no idea how all this time travel bullshit or those paradoxes work. You better ask Five about it. But I mean … does it matter? You are alive again. Only that matters.”

“I guess so” He didn't sound too sure of himself so Klaus nudged him a bit rougher than strictly necessary.

“What's on your mind, Benerino?”

“It's just … when I was dead and watched you at the asylum … I thought that … If I had never died, none of this would have ever happened, you know? I would like to believe that, if I hadn't died at seventeen, I could have prevented you from spiraling out of control the way you did, that I could have prevented what happened after Dad’s death even.” Ben said as he looked out of the window and watched the city below. A part of Klaus wondered how much time Ben had spent thinking about these things, imagining a world where he hadn't died. “I would like to believe that _I_ would have noticed that Cha-Cha and Hazel kidnapped you - hell, I would have killed them when they were shooting up this house and you would have never been kidnapped in the first place. I would like to believe that you never traveled back in time if I had been alive and that none of this shit with Vanya would have happened. But here we are. We still traveled through time, so the apocalypse still happened, right?”

Ben had always been a person who ran around with the weight of the world on his shoulders. Even as children, Ben had always been certain that he was in some way responsible for what happened in the world around him even if he had nothing to do with it. He had always liked to blame himself for some things or argued that certain things wouldn't have happened if he had been there to prevent it. Klaus knew and had always known that this hadn't changed with Ben’s death. Ben, however, was not the only person in this family who could play this game. 

“As I said before, Benjamin - I have no idea how all this works,” Klaus said. He felt tired just thinking about those endless possibilities. “But I think that you are right. None of this would've happened if you never died because you would have kicked all our asses. Maybe … Maybe in this new timeline, nothing of this shit did happen the way it happened in our timeline and when we traveled back to the future, we sort of … took the places of the ‘us’ in this timeline. Maybe for them, the apocalypse never happened.”

“But Dad is still dead and Five still got stuck in the future.”

“Yeah maybe … Maybe the old man decided not to meddle too much with the events that unfolded - or that Five got stuck would have happened regardless. Let's be honest, do you really think Five would have ever listened to the old man regardless of what Reggie would have said to him about time travel?”

“You've got a point.” Ben snorted. “Five was a horrible kid.”

“He _is_ a horrible kid.” Klaus corrected swiftly. Only this morning he had gotten into a full-blown fight at Griddy’s with some stranger about his choice of beverage. “So … from this, we can assume that everything largely happened the way it happened for us, the only exception being you not dying and thus being there to help us handle everything.”

“I always knew I was the most important member of the academy. One might go as far as to say that I saved the world.”

“Showoff.” Klaus laughed and took one last drag of the cigarette before snipping it out the window. “I’m glad you are all squishy again.”

“I’m glad to be squishy too.” Ben grinned in response. There was so much on his mind that he wanted to say to Ben. He wanted to say sorry for conjuring him on the day of his funeral. He wanted to say sorry for ruining Ben’s chance to move on into a peaceful afterlife. He wanted to say sorry for being so selfish. “I was afraid,” Ben suddenly said. “to go into the light, you know? It wasn’t you who kept me here. I was afraid to move on. And when the chance presented itself to stay … I took it. I never said anything, even though I knew that you blame yourself for me not moving on and finding peace. I want you to know that it wasn’t your fault.”

He didn't know what to say to this. So, he just sat there and took a drag from his cigarette before he allowed a wheezing little chuckle to escape. He tried to pretend that the stinging in his eyes just came from the smoke of the cigarette but he knew that he couldn't fool Ben. “Wow” He breathed out. “Wow … and all this time I thought … that it was my fault that you didn't go to Heaven.”

“Sorry.” Ben murmured and there was nothing Klaus could say or do right now. Maybe it was not even necessary. Still, after a few moments of hesitation, he opened his mouth yet again.

“Thank you … for staying. I don't know what I would have done without you all those years.”

They fell into a comfortable silence again for a moment and it was like it always used to be between them during those past thirteen years that they had spent together. They just sat there and watched the stars above a city that had no clue of what they had gone through. He dragged a hand through his messy short hair at this thought. They were back in 2019. There was no apocalypse. Ben lived. Everything was as it should be. Everything was as if nothing bad had ever happened. Sometimes, Klaus woke up in the middle of the night screaming in terror from his nightmares of the asylum only to find himself in his childhood bedroom and every time, suddenly, he wouldn't be sure anymore if he had just imagined all of this. 

“Hey … You think Dave lived?” He finally turned back to Ben and his brother gave a deep sigh and a small shrug of his shoulders.

“We should find out” He then smiled in understanding. He hadn't talked much about Dave with anyone so far. Sure, Diego knew the story and Ben knew it too. Luther and Allison only knew parts of it and he didn't plan on changing that anytime soon. Speaking about Dave and about Vietnam was just … hard. And now it was as if it all hadn't even happened. In this timeline, it probably hadn't happened. But that didn't make his pain any less real. “Tomorrow we’ll head to the library and see what we can find out.”

“Klaus!” A voice suddenly called from the courtyard below them and as he looked down, he could see Luther standing and waving his arms like an overly-motivated flight attendant. “Hey! You’ve got a visitor!”

“A visitor?” He turned to Ben in confusion as if his brother would know who it was but Ben, that little shitheel, just shrugged in response. “Coming!” He then yelled back to Luther before he swung his legs back inside the room and snipped the cigarette out of the window. Good thing Pogo hadn't seen that or otherwise he would get grounded for weeks. Not that the Chimp had already grounded him as an adult but he had certainly threatened it. 

“How exciting. I wonder who it's gonna be.” It wasn’t like Klaus had many friends out there, after all. Sure, he knew loads of people. Ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends, ex-dealers and ex-johns, ex-this and ex-that but, friends? No. There was no such thing as friendship when living on the streets. It was all about survival out there. If he had ever been friendly with others it was only to further his own selfish desires. Then again, they had been on TV just the other day. Well, not they, really. But there had been a report about them because of their father’s death. Reginald’s death had spurred loads of attention in the media, of course. Magazines were printing special issues about the life of ‘one of the greatest men in modern history’, TV stations were putting out documentaries, boulevard magazines were digging into the lives of the Hargreeves children in a ‘where are they now?’ kind of way. Surely, someone out of Klaus’ illustrious past had seen that, remembered him and now wanted in on the money. “Probably an old dealer or an ex-boyfriend who saw me on TV after that stupid report on the news the other day about Dad’s death and our reunion at the mansion. Urgh, I hated that photo that they used. Like, couldn't they have taken some other photo than a mugshot? Geez. Way to ruin my reputation.”

Ben chuckled but didn't even dignify Klaus’ remark about the mugshot with a response. Instead, his formerly dead brother followed him back downstairs as if they were still attached at the hips. 

It was a habit they both couldn't seem to shake after so long a time being tethered together. They were home for two weeks now and Klaus still had trouble getting rid of the habits he had built in the asylum too. He was still getting up at sunrise, made his bed properly, got dressed, cleaned up, and headed to breakfast - only to realize then that he was no longer in the asylum and no longer needed to wait in line for his food. Then, when Mom would hand him a plate, he would sit at the kitchen table and would feel lost. Most days he was up earlier than anyone else. Luther and Allison seemed to have a much easier time getting readjusted. Then again, Allison was already in L.A. to see Claire and she wouldn't be back before the end of next week. He couldn't blame her for that. 

These days, the only thing reminding Klaus that the asylum had really happened was the bracelets he and his siblings were still wearing. It was odd. A part of him had expected that his siblings would take them off and act as if nothing had happened. A part of him had been sure that everything would go back to the way it was before the time travel. But it wasn’t like it was before. His siblings were still wearing those stupid bracelets that he had made for them. Luther still hung around him when Klaus was alone somewhere. Sometimes, Luther would just pick him up in a hug and squeeze him out of the blue. It was all a bit strange. 

As he arrived downstairs he was confused and surprised to see an elderly gentleman sitting on one of the sofas in the family room. Diego was hovering behind the bar with suspicion written all over his face at the sight of this stranger. The man’s face seemed oddly familiar but Klaus couldn't quite put his finger on it. Then again, he had seen and met many people over the years. He couldn't remember every single one of them. If this was one of his former Johns, Klaus was relieved that Diego was there just in case the man would try anything. The stranger’s face, however, dropped as his eyes met Klaus’.

“I can't believe it,” The old man said. “You didn't age a day.”

He exchanged a confused look with Ben and then with Diego but both his brothers just shrugged their shoulders and proved, as per usual, to be of no help at all. Diego seemed to make a point of pouring himself a beer even though he usually drank straight out of the bottle like a caveman. He probably thought that the way he did it looked intimidating to that poor old guy. It didn't. 

“I’m sorry, Sir” Klaus replied with a confused smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. He missed his old self. He missed the cocky asshole he once was. He hated how submissive he still sounded. He tried a lopsided grin to deflect from his abject tone. “Have we met?”

“If we did” The old man replied but in contrast to his words, he didn't sound unsure at all. “everything you told me was true and time travel exists. And since what they said about you and your family on TV seems to be true, that doesn't seem too far-fetched of a thought.”

As Klaus was still none the wiser, the man continued with a low chuckle leaving his throat. There was something strangely, painfully familiar about that sound.

“Let me tell you a story.” He said. “When I was still young and living my life in Dallas and minding my own business, a young man came into the hardware store I was working for and chatted with me. That same young man then found me at a restaurant and tried to convince me to not get enlisted in the army like every man in my family before me. He told me horrible stories about how I would find my death in the Vietnam war. Three years later, I visited that same young man inside a mental asylum and then, I couldn't believe my eyes, I saw him again just four days ago, on TV.”

By now, Ben’s eyes were bulging out of his head and Diego’s beer was overflowing and running over his hand that was holding the glass.

“Dave” Klaus gasped and the face of the man lit up as Klaus finally recognized him. He couldn't quite explain why but he felt a pang of hurt in his chest. Maybe it was because this Dave was not _his_ Dave. This Dave had never fallen in love with him. To him, their love wasn’t real and to Klaus … to Klaus, it started to become nothing but a dream. It was bittersweet in a way.

“Hey Diego,” Ben called out to their shell-shocked brother behind the bar. “Can you help me with that thing I asked you about?”

“What thing?”

“ _The_ thing.”

“Oh, _the_ thing.” Diego nodded and quickly hurried out from behind the bar with his glass in hand. As he was about to walk past Klaus, he bumped his shoulder with Klaus’ and leaned in so only Klaus would be able to hear his next words. “If you need help, just yell, we’ll stay close by.”

“I think I can handle it, Sunshine.” Diego cast one more look at Dave and then walked out with a grunt, leaving Klaus alone with Dave now. A part of him wished that he wouldn't be alone with him. Slowly, he took a breath to steady himself and walked closer towards the man, sitting down on an armchair near him but still far enough away from Dave. He felt like walking through a dream. Nothing really made sense and, for just a second or two, he was terrified to wake up in that small room in the asylum again. What if he was still there?

“I can't … I’m a bit-”

“Speechless?” Dave asked and in the mischievous glint in his eyes, Klaus could see the man he had fallen in love with a lifetime ago. Even in his seventies, Dave still looked very handsome. His dirty blonde hair had gone grey, his face showed wrinkles around his eyes and mouth and forehead, signs of the wisdom he gained over the past 56 years. “Yeah me too, pal. There I was minding my own business and then I saw your face on the TV, throwing me in for a loop. I just sat there, staring at the photo and thinking to myself _‘That’s the guy from the 60s!’'_ ”

“If it's worth anything” Klaus muttered. “I’m sorry for scaring you the way I did back then.”

“Don't be,” Dave shrugged, the same friendly smile never leaving his face. “If it wouldn't have been for you, I would have joined the army and I would have died on that hill you told me about. I had time to read up about the war, about the experiences of others. I could talk to people who were on that hill. If it wouldn't have been for you, I would have walked straight into a massacre. I have to thank you, Klaus, for saving my life. You went to the mental asylum because you tried to warn me and I never got to repay you. I remember coming back from the war, thinking about your words, thinking about the war. After a while, I went back to the sanatorium to see if you were still there and heard that you escaped shortly after my visit.” Dave then breathed out a chuckle - the same chuckle he had fallen in love with. “Turns out you really were a time traveler and just went back home, huh?”

“Yeah,” Klaus replied with a faint huff of his own. Talking to Dave now was the strangest thing he had ever done for sure. He still couldn't quite wrap his head around it. But there he was. _Dave_. His Dave. And yet, not his Dave at all. “We actually returned only two weeks ago.”

“So … for you, this all just happened?”

“Yes,” He sighed. “For me … this all _just_ happened.” And it was still wearing him down. He was still having nightmares - if he could sleep at all that was. He didn't want to talk about himself, though. This man … He wasn't the Dave he had known. He wasn't his Dave. He would probably listen to him just the same but … he couldn't burden this man with everything. “So … how has life treated you?”

“Oh,” Dave laughed. “I’m not gonna lie, I struggled a little after the war. I came back home, my family was proud, I took over Uncle Brian’s business, got married, had two children. I did what was expected of me, I did what I thought I needed to do. I did the ‘ _right thing’_.”

Thinking that Dave had gotten married hurt. He couldn't deny it. It hurt. It was irrational and it was stupid and it hurt like hell. “Wow...” He murmured, unable to look at the other man now. Instead, he started fiddling with the hem of the black ACDC shirt he stole from Diego’s closet and that was two sizes too big for him. It was like wearing a safety blanket. “I’m … Congratulations, I guess.”

“It took me a while,” Dave then said. “To realize that this wasn't what I wanted from life, though. I was a bit of a late bloomer, I guess, but I never forgot that pretty young man from the 60s who told me he loved me and was trying to save my life. In the end, you saved my life in more ways than you can imagine. I decided to be honest to myself at last. I found a man who I fell in love with, I got a divorce, I built my own life - and if it hadn't been for you, I might have spent the rest of my life miserable, living a lie, maybe killing myself at some point when it would, inevitably, have gotten too hard to live like this.”

He couldn't stop the tears that fell from his eyes at those words and he couldn't even describe why they came or why he felt so much pain in the pit of his stomach. Dave, however, reached out to him. He could see the wedding band on his finger and the feeling got even worse. He wanted to curl up somewhere dark and cold and never return to the land of the living. God, that little bitch on that bike, really had it in for him, huh? Throwing the love of his life at him only to rip him away from him again, then sending him back in time to meet that same man again, and now presenting him with the future he could have had with Dave if he wouldn’t have died. It was like she kept dangling a carrot right in front of his nose.

“I’m sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you,” Dave said solemnly as he clasped Klaus’ right hand with both of his. They were calloused and had wrinkles and were still the same strong hands that Klaus knew. The same strong hands that had touched him in the dead of night whenever they had snuck out in secret. The same strong hands that had kept him grounded when his nightmares had gotten the better of him or when withdrawal had gotten so bad that he thought his skin was peeling off. 

“No” Klaus hiccuped. “No, it's not that … it's not your fault. I’m … happy for you. All I ever wanted was you to be happy and save and you are. That's the most important thing it just … it hurts that it couldn't be with me” He then confessed with a smile tugging on the corners of his mouth. “When I traveled back in time and ended up in that tent in Vietnam at the foot of your bed … It was just … the weirdest thing I ever experienced. I was terrified and confused and you were there to help me through it. You were the first person I ever loved more than myself, the first person who ever saw something else than a junkie or a fuck-up in me. I could've gone back home at any time … but I stayed for you. I would have … I would have stayed forever, you know? I would have kept fighting the war, gone home with you afterward, and grown old with you if you hadn’t died. I’m happy that you got to have a proper life and that you have someone you love but … I wished it was me.”

Dave was quiet for a moment before he nodded and hummed in understanding. “It hurts, I understand. As crazy as this story is, I understand. I wished there was something I could do for you after you did so much for me.”

“It's okay” Klaus shook his head. “It's fine. It's enough for me to know that you didn't die, that you had a good life. I am happy that, for once, I could do something good for someone else.”

“Well, if it helps, I can promise you that I would have fallen head over heels for you if you had come into my life again.” That actually startled a laugh out of Klaus.

“You always knew how to charm my socks off, Mr. Katz” He huffed. Again, it was bittersweet as they looked at each other. He could still see that young man in him as he looked in Dave’s blue eyes. He didn't know if Dave would ever understand what Klaus went through and what he felt but maybe it was better this way. Their love had never had any future, to begin with, but he was still glad that he had met him and fallen in love with him. He was still thankful for it, even despite the pain. Maybe that was what the little girl in the sky had intended for him. Maybe falling in love with Dave had been a lesson he was supposed to learn.

Even as Dave left the house again and Klaus watched him walk down the street, he felt a strange sensation of happiness. He stood there for the longest time, just watching how Dave walked off and got tinier and tinier the further he went until a heavy arm dropped around his shoulders and a head leaned against his.

“I missed your musk.” Klaus hummed and Diego grunted.

“How are we doing?”

“I’ll live … probably.” He said with a small smirk directed at his brother and wrapped his arm around Diego’s waist. It was good that he could do this again. It helped to ground him in the here and now and stopped him from floating away again. It helped him to remind himself that he was no longer in the asylum. He was home. He had his siblings with him and they would protect him - even though Five wanted to prod around in his brain since they came back and find out what else Klaus could do. 

“But you don't feel like it,” Diego concluded and squeezed his shoulder. A part of him just wanted to break down and cry in his brother’s chest like he used to when they were children. He wanted to retreat into that place of being a small, scared child in need of his brother’s protection and love. 

“I will … eventually.” Klaus then decided with a sigh and leaned in closer. “I mean … yeah, I’m sad and heartbroken. This chapter of my life is now closed forever - fuck … I mean, my relationship with Dave never existed in this timeline now. I undid the one good thing that happened during that fucked-up week, the one true love I ever experienced. It's like it never happened. It might as well have been a dream now or a … hallucination.”

“No, it's not” Diego replied quietly. “You experienced it. You felt his touch and heard his voice and you loved him when you were together. Regardless of what happened in this new timeline, it doesn't make it any less real - and you are allowed to feel heartbroken and sad about it.”

“I’m happy too, though.” He said and actually meant it. A part of him really was happy. “I wanted to save him and I did. He’s alive. He’s married. He has a family and a loving husband. He has his own farm in Texas like he always wanted. I’m happy that he’s happy. Let's be honest … none of us are good when it comes to relationships. The most stable relationship any of us experienced was when Five was shagging that mannequin. If Dave and I would have stayed together or ended up together again … it would have ended badly for us both. I just wished we could have saved Eudora too. She didn't deserve to die in that motel room and just because of me. It's not fair that certain things changed and this stayed the same. She was a proper hero - my hero.” 

Even in this timeline, Klaus had been kidnapped. Even in this timeline, Eudora had found him and had gotten killed. The only difference was that his siblings had noticed sooner and that Diego had found them right when it happened. He had been too late to save her and Cha-Cha and Hazel had paid the price for it. It wasn’t fair.

“Eudora was … she lived for the job.” Diego muttered. “She was … a proper cop. She believed in the good of humanity. She could see good in everything and everyone, a hopeless optimist. She never gave up on people. She shouldn't have died. She just … She shouldn't have died. And yet, I believe that, if she could talk right now, she would be proud to have died protecting someone else. She always said that her biggest fear was to die a meaningless death in some sort of accident or to some illness. I’m still pissed that she died though. And I will be pissed for a while longer.”

“Yeah … me too.” He sighed. “There’s so much to work through, isn't there?”

“I guess so” Diego muttered. “Let's just hope that we will actually get the time to do so and not have to deal with yet another apocalypse. I need a vacation.” 

“Amen.” Klaus huffed as they turned away from the street and walked back into the house. Tomorrow, the sun would rise again and he would get out of bed with the first rays of sunlight. He would make his bed, get showered and dressed, and then go downstairs to have breakfast. He would end up sitting at that kitchen table feeling lost once again. “Will it ever get better?” He turned to Diego as they were in the middle of the entrance hall and looked down at the broken chandelier. They should probably get this cleaned up. 

“I don't know” Diego replied softly before he pressed a kiss to the side of his head. No one was here to witness it, so no one was here to make fun of him. Apparently, Diego had not noticed Ben standing at the top of the stairs watching his brothers with a fond smile. 

**-End of Chapter 11-**

**Author's Note:**

> Lila will probably in this fic - but she will not become a major part


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